ArmInfo. The pre-election situation in Artsakh continues to heighten, another incident involving the associates of various presidential candidates took place in Karvachar. According to the Artsakh Police, the village headman of the Vakunis community of the Karvachar district, Eduard Zakaryan, appealed the law enforcement officers, saying that he was beaten by a group of people.
Subsequently, Zakaryan said that those who had beaten him were associates of the former head of the NKR Defense Army Samvel Babayan, who collected signatures to amend the Constitution of the republic so that Babayan could run for the 2020 presidential election.
According to Zakaryan, the dispute that had developed into a fight was due to the fact that Babayan's comrades did not like the room that the village administration had allocated to collect signatures. Meanwhile, the office of Samvel Babayan categorically denied the words of Zakaryan, saying that an atmosphere of fear reigns in Karvachar. According to Babayan's office, Zakaryan himself was the first to attack the members of the initiative group collecting signatures in order to hinder the process. The statement states that no one beat Zakaryan, one of the members of the initiative group only pushed him in self-defense, the latter fell and hit his head on the floor, receiving abrasions in the forehead area. Despite the incident and the "atmosphere of fear", as stated in the statement, members of the initiative group in the village of Vakunis managed to collect 97% of the signatures of the residents.
It should be noted that a few days ago, a shootout occurred on the Sevan-Yerevan highway, in which the associates of Samvel Babayan accused the former Prime Minister of Artsakh Arayik Harutyunyan, who also claims the presidency, and his supporters. Harutyunyan and his office categorically denied any involvement in the incident. Law enforcement officials said the incident was not of a political nature, but occurred on a domestic basis. In fact, two Artsakh citizens were detained.
After this incident, in front of the office of the Free Motherland Party, headed by Harutyunyan, a stabbing occurred. According to the media, its participants were again supporters of two presidential candidates. However, neither party took responsibility for this incident.