Armenia’s Investigative Committee has accused former MP Argam Abrahamyan of ordering a hit on a man he believed was having an affair with his wife. Abrahamyan is the son of former Armenian Prime Minister Hovik Abrahamyan and the son-in-law of opposition figure Gagik Tsarukyan.

The roughly one-minute video, published on Saturday morning, shows masked National Security Service (NSS) officers raiding Abrahamyan’s home, forcing him to the ground and handcuffing him. He was arrested, and two days later was placed in custody for two months. He denies the charges, while his lawyer, Yerem Sargsyan, told RFE/RL that his client considers the accusation ‘an obvious absurdity’.

Abrahamyan is accused of ordering his bodyguard, Gegham Hakobyan, to murder a man described as a clergyman from a religious organisation. According to investigators, Abrahamyan suspected the victim was having an affair with his wife.

Sargsyan argues that this narrative about his defendant is just a theory, and not a fact; however, the Investigative Committee went on to publish the case details on Abrahamyan’s private life. Abrahamyan criticised the move, arguing that while the collection of these details is an integral part of the investigation, their publication is unlawful and did not serve public interest in the case.

The case started in 2023, when Hakobyan, Abrahamyan’s bodyguard, was detained over the killing. It was then sent to court in 2024 and remained there until recently. Prosecutors returned to the case three years after the killing, shortly after Abrahamyan’s father-in-law, Gagik Tsarukyan, was arrested on financial crime charges.

The disclosure of personal information has raised concerns from Armenia’s civil society and Human Rights Defender Anahit Manasyan.

‘Such a statement is particularly unacceptable and sensitive from the point of view of protecting women’s rights. From a human rights perspective, it is also incomprehensible in this context to emphasise such sensitive information as a circumstance related to religious belief within the framework of public communication’, read Manasyan’s office’s statement.

When referring to women’s rights violations, the statement referred to Anrahamyan’s wife Emma Trarukyan, whose alleged infidelity was a topic of discussion in the Investigative Committee’s report.

This is not the first time that the Investigative Committee has released footage of a home raid. Following Pashinyan’s rise to power in 2018, videos of the arrests of politicians and businesspeople, including former military leader and ex-MP Manvel Grigoryan, former Prime Minister Hovik Abrahamyan, and Gagik Tsarukyan, became standard practice. Those videos follow Pashinyan’s repeated pledges to go ‘after all illegal properties piece by piece’.

Less than a month earlier, on 7 July, the Investigative Committee published a video of Tsarukyan’s arrest, showing around 10 NSS officers using force against him at his residence. The officers pulled Tsarukyan by the leg and laid him on the ground before taking him away in handcuffs. Back then, Manasyan also shared a statement, stating that disproportionate physical force had been used against a man who, according to the video, showed no resistance. As well as using handcuffs that are visibly too small for Tsarukyan.