Gunmen who have been barricaded in a police station in the Armenian capital for 10 days took members of an ambulance crew hostage on Wednesday after they came in to treat those wounded in an exchange of fire with officers, police said. A policeman and two gunmen were taken to hospital, while two wounded gunmen stayed at the police station.
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Police were rejecting the demand late on July 26 and urging the crowd of protesters near the occupied building to move the demonstration to another location.
The National Security Service, which still believes it is possible to end the hostage standoff through dialogue and negotiations, has called on the armed extremists to immediately cease their lawlessness and violence, which endanger peoples’ lives and well-being and threats against property. “Three other health professionals, two doctors and a nurse, are still being held”, he said. It set no deadline.
Negotiations were continuing to get the remaining gunmen – supporters of fringe jailed opposition leader Zhirair Sefilyan who have demanded the president step down – to lay down their weapons, he said. Dozens of people are gathering nearby every day, demanding that bloodshed be avoided.
Authorities on Wednesday issued warrants for the detention of 47 former executives or senior journalists of Zaman newspaper, allegedly associated with the U.S.-based Muslim cleric who the government says is behind…
The gunmen said the doctors had been asked to stay rather than taken hostage. In June Sefilian and six other men were arrested on suspicion of plotting a coup, Armenian Weekly reported.
“They just want the doctors to be there permanently to help the wounded guys”, Alex Yenikomshian, a member of the opposition Founding Parliament movement, told reporters.
Police initially accused Sefilian of preparing a plot to seize government buildings and telecommunication facilities in Yerevan.
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Founding Parliament is sharply critical of the way Armenia’s government has dealt with the long-running conflict over Azerbaijan’s breakaway region of Nagorno-Karabakh, a territory that both Armenia and Azerbaijan claim.
