Two years ago, this day (March 1) the bloodiest post-election clashes in the history of independent Armenia took place, when opposition supporters and police clashed, resulting in 10 deaths and dozens of injuries.

Today the opposition headed by leader of the Armenian National Congress (ANC) Levon Ter-Petrosyan will hold a rally in front of Matenadaran (Mesrop Mashtots Institute of Ancient Manuscripts) to commemorate that day.

As a result of the scheduled rally, all roads entering Yerevan are strictly under police control, and buses are being denied entry into the capital.

“The authorities try to create as many obstacles as possible,” Vladimir Karapetyan, ANC representative, told ArmeniaNow. “Since last week we have been getting alarms from provincial residents saying that our supporters were being called to the Police office for ‘explanatory talks’ during which they were being persuaded not to participate in the rally.”

During the past two years the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) adopted four resolutions on Armenia, demanding to hold an appropriate investigation and reveal those who were responsible for the deaths (of March 1), none has yet been held accountable.

On Friday (February 26) the victims’ parents sent a letter to the members of PACE Permanent and Monitoring Committees, mentioning that they are not satisfied with the work done by PACE co-rapporteurs George Colombier and John Prescott, stating that “due to inactivity and indifference of the co-rapporteurs, the Armenian authorities started to claim publicly, that the March 1 page is closed…”

“How do they dare to close the page of March 1, if no one has borne the responsibility for the murder of our sons yet, even those four police officers (the police officers who used “Cheryomukha 7” special device, killing three people), whose responsibility was confirmed even by the authorities, are not punished,” Alla Hovhannisyan, mother of 23-year-old victim of March 1-2 clashes, Tigran Khachatryan, told ArmeniaNow.