The Department for the Protection of State Interests of the RA Prosecutor General's Office studied the state of compliance with the requirements of the legislation on the protection of monuments in the area of implementation of the Northern Avenue and Cascade development projects in Yerevan. The basis was the documents received from the “Anti-Corruption Center of Transparency International” NGO, divisions of the RA Prosecutor’s Office, Yerevan Municipality and the “National Archives of Armenia” SNCO of the Ministry of Justice of the Republic of Armenia.
As a result of extensive research, it was found that the Decree of the Government of the Republic of Armenia dated 25.10.2000. No. 774 and dated July 16, 2001, in the area of implementation of the development projects of the Northern Avenue and the Cascade of the city of Yerevan, approved by decisions No. 645, there were 19 immovable monuments of history and culture of the USSR, of republican or local significance, withdrawn from the state register at different addresses Pushkin Street, Aram, Abovyan, Tumanyan, Teryan, Old Yerevantsi. They were included in the lists of immovable monuments of history and culture of Yerevan, of which only the monument on st. Pushkin 25 was partially preserved, and the rest were demolished.
According to information received from the "Office for the Implementation of Development Investment Programs in Yerevan", there is no information about some of the mentioned monuments, and information about some of the monuments is incomplete.
According to the information received from Yerevan Municipality, in the archival materials of the Municipality there are only 4 permits for the demolition of monuments, and according to information received from the “National Archives of Armenia” SNCO of the Ministry of Justice of Armenia, the documents on the demolition of monuments were not transferred to the National Archives of Armenia.
In other words, during this period from 2000 to 2010, the relevant officials of Yerevan Municipality, as well as the Ministry of Culture, showed an unfair or negligent attitude towards the service, as a result of which the functions of protection and control of monuments were not performed or were performed improperly. As a result, 18 cultural monuments were completely destroyed and 1 was partially preserved in the development area of the Northern Avenue and the Cascade of Yerevan. In addition, there are no materials prepared and criminal cases initiated on the facts of the demolition and damage of these monuments.
Bearing in mind that during the study, such factual circumstances were revealed that contain Article 315 of the former Criminal Code of the Republic of Armenia, which was in force at the time of the commission of the act (Part 1 of Article 446 of the current Criminal Code of the Republic of Armenia), as well as in accordance with Article 264 of Part 1 of the same former Code (Part 1 of Article 301 of the current Criminal Code of the Republic of Armenia), data on the characteristics of obvious criminal acts. The results of the study were sent to the RA Investigative Committee with an instruction to resolve the issue of initiating a criminal case.
