Thursday, October 27 2016 13:06

ArmInfo. Today, the National Assembly of Armenia paid tribute to the memory of the victims of the 27 October 1999 act of terrorism in the parliament. Earlier today,  the parliamentarians laid flowers to the memorial for their killed  colleagues.  To recall, the Armenian parliament shooting, commonly  known in Armenia as October 27 was a terrorist attack on the Armenian  National Assembly in the capital Yerevan on October 27, 1999, by a  group of five armed men led by Nairi Hunanyan that, among others,  killed the two de facto decision-makers in the country's political  leadership - Prime Minister Vazgen Sargsyan and Parliament Speaker  Karen Demirchyan. Sargsyan and Demirchyan were posthumously honored  with National Hero of Armenia titles. The murderers also shot dead  Yuri Bakhshyan, Deputy National Assembly Speaker, Ruben Miroyan,  Deputy National Assembly Speaker, Leonard Petrosyan, Minister of  Urgent Affairs, MPs Henrik Abrahamyan, Armenak Armenakyan, Mikayel  Kotanyan.  

The five men were charged with terrorism aimed at undermining  authority on 29 October. The five main perpetrators of the shooting  (Nairi Hunanyan, his younger brother Karen Hunanyan, their uncle Vram  Galstyan, Derenik Ejanyan and Eduard Grigoryan) were sentenced to  life in prison on December 2, 2003.