Recent CO Action alerts

War Resisters' International learned from Forum 18 News Service about a new wave of sentences against Jehovah's Witnesses refusing military service in Armenia. Arman Agazaryan (ARM14713) refused to be drafted into the army on grounds of religious conscience, and was arrested on 23 December 2004. He was tried in Yerevan in mid-March, and received a prison sentence of 1 1/2 years in prison. He is now being held in Nubarashen prison. Sergei Hovhanissyan (ARM14714) was sentenced to 1 1/2 years in early March and is now being held in Nubarashen prison.

On 9 March 2005, Staff Sgt. Nimrod Regev was sentenced to 21 days in Military Prison 6 for refusing to do guard duty at the Yitzhar settlement. Yitzhar is one of the most aggressive settlements in the Occupied Territories; its residents have been responsible for countless attacks on the neighbouring Palestinian villages, damage to their agricultural land and trees, and even foring villagers of Khirbet Yanoun to evacuate. Nimrod Regev is 28 years old and moved recently to Tel Aviv with his wife Shiri. He is due to be released on 27 March 2005.

Yahel Avigur (ISR14709), a pacifist conscientious objector to military service from Qiriat Motzkin, near Haifa has been sentenced on Sunday, 27 February 2005, to 28 days in military prison. The charge against him was that he refused to wear military uniform. He was not imprisoned immediately. Rather, he was detained yesterday in the Beit-Lid military base, and is due to be transferred to Military Prison No. 4 in Tzrifin today (1 March). He is due to be released from prison on Friday, 25 March 2005. It is very likely that he will be sent to prison again soon afterwards, probably several times.

Areg Hovhanesyan (NKR14710), a Jehovah's Witness, has been sentenced to 4 years imprisonment on 16 February for refusing to perform military service. The sentenced was handed down by a court in the Stepanakert, the capital of the unrecognised Nagorno-Karabakh republic. Hovhanesyan told the court that he would be prepared to do an alternative, non-military service.

War Resisters' International learned via Forum 18 News Service about two more conscientious objectors from Turkmenistan who presently serve prison sentences. Atamurat Suvkhanov (TKM14707), 18, was sentenced to 18 months' imprisonment in the north-eastern town of Dashoguz on 17 December 2004. Begench Shakhmuradov, 26, was sentenced around 10 February in the Azatlyk district of the capital Ashgabad to one year's imprisonment. Both Suvkhanov and Shakhmuradov were sentenced under Article 219 of the Criminal Code, which punishes refusal to serve in the Armed Forces.

Today, on 4 February 2004, the police tried to arrest Serbian conscientious objector Dragoslav Dojkic. In the morning police visited his home, but he was not at home. The police left a message with his mother that he is wanted, and that he will be arrested and forced to sign his call up order for the military.

Dragoslav Djokic turned conscientious objector during the NATO bombing campaign against Yugoslavia in 1999. Then, a cluster bomb was dropped into his backyard, seriously injuring one of his neighbours.

Armen Grigoryan, a religious conscientious objector who is considering to become a Jehovah's Witness, has been taken to an Armenian military unit in Nagorno-Karabakh, Forum 18 News Service reported on 6 January 2005. Armen Grigoryan, the 18-year-old son of a Jehovah's Witness family, was summoned to the military recruitment office in Yerevan on 21 June 2004.

War Resisters' International received a report from Forum 18 News Service about conscientious objector Gagik Mirzoyan. Mirzoyan, a Baptist, who refuses on religious grounds to serve in the military of the unrecognised republic of Nagorno-Karabakh, was called up for military service on 6 December 2004. It is presently not known where he is being held. Baptist sources in Nagorno-Karabakh told Forum 18 News Service that Gagik Mirzoyan was beaten by one of his unit commanders on 15 December 2004, after he rejected attempts to pressure him to abandon his faith and serve in the army.

The Naval Court of Piraeus yesterday sentenced Giorgios Monastiriotis for desertion. He was sentenced to 5 months' imprisonment on suspension in case of appeal. This means that Monastiriotis has now been sentenced twice for the same 'offence'.

follow-up on GR12008-091204 (http://wri-irg.org/news/htdocs/20041209a.html)

Greek conscientious objector Lazaros Petromelidis has today been sentenced to 2 1/2 years imprisonment for two charges of "insubordination", dating from 26 July 1999 and 3 July 2003. The trial was carried out in his absence. Lazaros Petromelidis chose to fax the court a letter today explaining the reasons why he would not appear in court.

Finnish total objector Daniel Koponen, a 21-years old student from Espoo, started to serve his prison sentence on Thursday, 16 December 2004. He will spent 197 days behind bars.

War Resisters' International learned today that conscientious objector Halil Savda is presently held at the military unit in Corlu-Tekirdag for "insisting on disobedience". War Resisters' International fears for his wellbeing, and believes that he is in danger of illtreatment and torture. Halil Savda was born in Sirnak/Cizre in 1974, and graduated from primary school. In 1993, he was arrested and held for 1 month in Sirnak/Cizre, during which time he was tortured repeatedly. The State Security Court then charged him with "supporting an illegal organisation (the PKK - Kurdish Workers Party)".

Conscientious objector Lazaros Petromelidis has a new trial on December 16th. He is accused of two draft evasions (1999 & 2003). Between September and November there were 4 attempts to arrest him.

Lazaros Petromelidis has been persecuted since 1992 when he declared his conscientious objection (before recognition of the right in 1997). He has been passed through a dozen trials, has been jailed 3 times and he is already sentenced to a 20 month suspended sentence.

Although the Armenian law on alternative service came into force on 1 July, the country continues to imprison conscientious objectors. So far, 5 new conscientious objectors have been sentenced in October 2004, Forum 18 News Service reports.

Karen Hakopyan (ARM14611) was sentenced to 2 years imprisonment - the maximum sentence - on 7 October for "evading a recurring call to emergency military service, or educational or military training, without a legal basis for being relieved of this service" (Art 327 part I of the criminal code).

On Sunday 26 September, IDF reservist G. S. was sentenced to 28 days for refusing to serve in the Occupied Territories. G. S. immigrated to Israel from South Africa 12 years ago, and told his trial on Sunday that his childhood in apartheid South Africa had been very influential on his willingness to go to prison for his beliefs. "I lived in a society where one group's survival translated into injustice for others. That's the situation in Gaza and I don't want to be part of that", he said according to an article in Ha'aretz from 27 September. G. S.

Greek Conscientious objector Giorgios Monastiriotis, the first professional soldier who refused to be sent to the Persian Gulf in May 2003, was arrested on Monday, 13 September 2004, and immediately tried and sentenced. In May 2003 Giorgos Monstaritiotis joined the Greek Navy on a 5 years contract, refused to embark with the crew of the battleship "Navarino" on a mission to the Persian Gulf. He declared his immediate resignation from the Navy instead. The Navarino was sailing to the Persian Gulf as part of operation "Enduring Freedom".