Owner of fire-bombed queer bar wins ECHR case against Armenia

PanARMENIAN.Net - The former co-owner of a queer-friendly bar in Armenia which was fire-bombed in 2012 has won a case against the government in the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), OC Media reports.

The court ordered Armenia to pay Armine Oganezova, who co-owned and managed the DIY bar in Yerevan, €12,000 ($12,600) in compensation plus legal costs for failing to protect her from homophobic abuse.

The ruling on Tuesday, May 17 coincided with International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia, and Transphobia, marked annually on 17 May.

DIY bar was set alight in 2012. In the weeks that followed, Oganezova was subjected to a campaign of harassment and intimidation by nationalists, who protested in front of the pub and vandalised what remained after the fire. After receiving death threats, Oganezova sought asylum in Sweden.

Two brothers who were members of a neo-Nazi group called Black Ravens Armenia were found guilty of setting the fire. A court in Armenia sentenced them to a two-year suspended prison sentence in 2013, and they were subsequently granted an amnesty.

Oganezova had appealed to the ECHR complaining that the authorities failed to protect her from harassment, attacks, and threats because of her sexual orientation or to investigate her complaints effectively.

She also claimed that the attack was backed by the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (ARF), a nationalist Armenian party․ The lawyer of one of the men convicted was a member of the party, while ARF MP Artsvik Minasyan paid his bail.

The court noted that the attack on the bar was publicly condoned by leading political figures in Armenia.