Political scientist Arkadi Vardanyan, who was released from prison after being there for about five and a half years, in his conversation with Forrighs.am spoke about what has changed in the penitentiaries after the revolution. He told that, although bribes were somewhat mitigated in the detention facilities, basically nothing else has been changed.
According to Vardanyan, though he did not personally bribe anyone or in any way cope with it, he has heard a lot about bribes. In order to get an idea of the dimensions of bribes, according to the political scientist, one should look at what kinds of cars the penitentiary officials are driving with their state [little] salary.
“As far as I know, with CE standards, 7 euros a day should be spent on every detainee, but I can say that two euros are hardly spent,” said the former convict.
Political analyst Arkadi Vardanyan, who the public mostly remembers for the huge rallies organized by him in Armenia in 2000, was kept in jail for about five years in a semi-closed regime, whereas in the last year and a half he had to be moved to a semi-opened regime. After a long struggle and the revolution, Vardanyan’s regime finally changed, and he was released from prison by amnesty.
It should be noted that political scientist Arkadi Vardanyan was sentenced to 10 years in prison for supporting the preparation of a friend’s father’s poisoning with his friend. Vardanyan himself considered the accusation absurd and groundless, and himself — a political prisoner of Serzh Sargsyan-Robert Kocharyan regime.
“The food of nearly 90 percent of the convicts is provided by their relatives because not a self-respecting dog would eat prison food,” said the political scientist.
Concerning the medical assistance provided to the convicts in the penitentiary institutions, according to the political scientist, it does not exist in penitentiaries.
“I can prove it with my personal example. When I appeared in the Vanadzor prison, which, I can say, is the most terrible one, there have been times when I had high blood pressure crisis. When the nurse measured my blood pressure, she looked at me with her eyes squared,” said the former prisoner, adding that, despite that fact, he was not given any medical care.
“Then they had to take me to the hospital in an ambulance, but they were only measuring blood pressure there. Basically, there were no good conditions and nothing was done. They were doing just nothing. How is it possible to cure a person by only measuring one’s blood pressure?”
About three weeks later, the political scientist was again transferred to the same prison, where his health crisis repeated.
See the details in Forrights.am’s interview with Arkadi Vardanyan.
Marine Kharatyan