ANN/GROONG - Gunmen open fire in Armenian parliament, eight reported killed

Gunmen open fire in Armenian parliament, eight reported killed
9.52 a.m. ET (1401 GMT) October 27, 1999
By Petya Magdashian, Associated Press


YEREVAN, Armenia (AP) — Gunmen opened fire today in the chamber of the
Armenian parliament during an address by the prime minister, an official
said, and news reports said eight people were killed.

The shots rang out as Prime Minister Vazgen Sarkisian was delivering a
speech, said Vage Gabrielian, spokesman for the president's office. He said
police had surrounded the building.

A1Plus, a local television station, reported that eight people had been
killed and several others taken hostage. The presidential spokesman refused
to say if there were any casualties.

Frightened lawmakers ran from the building. The unidentified gunmen were
believed holed up inside.

The premier's speech was being carried live on Armenian radio and the
transmission was cut after the shooting started, the ITAR-Tass news agency
reported.

Armenia became an independent republic following the Soviet collapse in 1991
and has endured years of political turmoil. Sarkisian is number two in the
country's government.

The 40-year-old former athletic instructor and Soviet propaganda official
was appointed premier by President Robert Kocharian last June.

Sarkisian is an ally of Armenia's Soviet-era leader Karen Demirchian, with
whom he co-chairs the hard-line Unity Party. Demirchian is speaker of the
parliament and reportedly he, too, was in the chamber at the time of the
attack.

Sarkisian's political movement forced the resignation of President Levon
Ter-Petrosian in February 1998. It accused him of pursuing "defeatist''
policies on the issue of independence for the Armenian enclave of
Nagorno-Karabakh by agreeing even to discuss returning territory to
Azerbaijan.

Sarkisian previously headed a nationalist group representing war veterans
who fought in Nagorno-Karabakh. Armenia and Azerbaijan fought a major war
over the enclave.

The premier's party was closely tied to a militia group known as the
Yerkrapah Battalion, which Western human rights groups have accused of
harassing religious organizations, especially those that discourage military
service.


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