Armenia’s Former Security Chief Found Dead

By Asbarez | Saturday, 18 January 2020

Armenia’s Former Armenian Security Chief Georgi Kutoyan

Armenia’s Former Security Chief Georgi Kutoyan

YEREVAN (Azatytyun.am)—Georgi Kutoyan, who headed Armenia’s National Security Service in the final years of former President Serzh Sarkisian’s rule, was found shot to death in Yerevan on Friday.

A spokeswoman for the Investigative Committee, Naira Harutiunyan, reported in the afternoon that Kutoyan’s body had a gunshot wound then it was discovered by his wife at his Yerevan apartment “a short while ago.”

Forensic experts and other officers of the law-enforcement agency are already “working at the scene,” Harutiunyan wrote on Facebook.

A high-ranking Investigative Committee official, Artur Melikyan, said later in the day that preliminary indications are that Kutoyan, 38, was killed by a gunshot fired at his head. But investigators also found dozens of bullets in the apartment and forensic experts will determine whether those were fired from the same pistol, he told reporters outside the apartment building cordoned off by police.

Melikyan said that premeditated murder is therefore one of the theories of Kutoyan’s death considered by the investigators.

“We don’t yet have information that anyone heard gunshots,” he said, adding that more residents of the apartment block will be questioned in the coming days.

A lawyer by education, Kutoyan had worked as an assistant to Sarkisian from 2011 until his surprise appointment as director of the NSS in February 2016. He was sacked by newly elected Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian in May 2018 immediately after the “Velvet Revolution” that toppled the country’s former leader.

Kutoyan has made no public statements since then. He also kept a low profile during his tenure.

Sarkisian offered condolences to Kutoyan’s family and said he is “deeply shocked” by the death of the former NSS chief whom described as a highly competent and “decent” individual. In a statement, the ex-president also called for public scrutiny of the unfolding probe of his death.

Kutoyan is the second former senior security official found shot dead in the last four months. Hayk Harutiunian, a former chief of the Armenian police, was found dead in his country house in September.

Harutiunyan reportedly had a gunshot wound to his head. Investigators suggested that he committed suicide.

In the months leading up to his death, Harutiunyan was repeatedly interrogated in an ongoing criminal investigation into the 2008 post-election violence in Yerevan. The Special Investigative Service, which is conducting that inquiry, told the Armenpress news agency that it never questioned Kutoyan as a witness or suspect.

The Investigative Committee and the NSS did not investigate or interrogate Kutoyan either, according to the committee spokeswoman.

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