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The criminal case against Armenia’s second President Robert Kocharyan has come to a deadlock, his lawyers insist.

At a news conference on Wednesday, one of the lawyers, Aram Orbelyan said the ex-president is under arrest pending the outcome of his trial, while that process is not supervised over by any judge.

“There is no court authorized to free [Kocharyan] or to make a decision on an alternative measure of restraint,” the lawyer said.

Orbelyan recalled that after the ruling of the Yerevan Criminal Court of Appeals to overturn a lower court’s decision to release Kocharyan and suspend his trial, the criminal case was sent back to the first instance court which was due to make a decision on scheduling hearings in the case, suspending or dropping the criminal case within 15 days, however no decision has been made so far.

“The case has come to s standstill for already one and a half month, which is clearly a gross violation of the human rights enshrined in the Constitution, the European Convention on Human Rights, and the UN International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights,” Orbelyan said.

The lawyer stressed a person cannot be arrested for an indefinite period without a possibility of appealing that decision.

“We have repeatedly announced that there is a motion to replace the arrest with a release on bail, but that and several other motions are no way considered. It does not matter which body is to blame for the situation – the General Jurisdiction Court, Court of Appeals, Court of Cassation, Supreme Judicial Council or the Prosecutor General’s Office… the state is responsible, since it fails to ensure the normal course of the case,” he said.