At today's trial, "Haykakan Zhamanak" Editor Nikol Pashinyan opened his testimony by describing the situation in Armenian both before and after the 2008 presidential elections and noted the names of some individuals on Levon Ter-Petrosyan's campaign staff that became targets of political persecution. He recalled the names of Suren Surenenyants, Aram Karapetyan, Gagik Jhangiryan and others. Mr. Pashinyan argued that the objective of the political persecutions was to silence those speaking out against the fraudulent elections and to convince them not to pursue constitutional means in their demands for justice. The jailed editor also referred to widespread election fraud that had taken place and the  restrictions placed on the media in reporting those violations. He categorically stated that the weapons found after the police forcibly dispersed demonstrators at Freedom Square on the morning of March 1, 2008, were placed by the cops and other law-enforcement employees. Mr. Pashinyan argued that Freedom Square wasn't the personal property of any individual opposition leader and thus, anything found there could not be legally ascribed to any of them. Mr. Pashinyan rhetorically asked why those weapons, allegedly brought to Freedom Square by the opposition to use against the police, were never used that morning when demonstrators were being beaten and injured. "If the weapons were brought by us to use against the authorities, why weren't they used?" he queried. He questioned why the police had declared a search of his whereabouts when everyone knew where he was after February 26 and that he had been in contact with several top-ranking police officials. Also at today's trial was Hmayak Hovhannisyan, who stated that on December 23 he would pull out of the race in the District 10 parliamentary by-election in favor of Pashinyan.