Gunmen who stormed Armenia’s parliament, slaughtering the prime minister and other top officials in a failed coup attempt, surrendered early today and released all their hostages, officials said.
They were turned over to police.
The breakthrough came after President Robert Kocharyan promised the gunmen a fair trial and assured their personal safety.
The attackers had invaded the building – in the capital of Yerevan – with guns blazing, mowing down terrified officials.
Government officials confirmed that Prime Minister Vazgen Sarkisian, Armenia’s No. 2 official, was killed in the bloody rampage.
Also dead were the speaker of parliament, two deputy speakers, the energy minister, two legislators and a top government economist.
The band of five or six gunmen remained barricaded inside parliament for hours, holding their terrified captives.
Armenian officials said the government was always in control through the siege.
But analysts fear the attack could mean chaos for the struggling and volatile nation, which won independence from the former Soviet Union in 1991.
The attackers’ motive was not clear.
One gunman was identified as former journalist Nairiu Unanyan, an ultranationalist who told frightened legislators his group was acting to “avenge those who have drunk the blood of the people.”
The assault came just hours after U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott departed Yerevan.
Talbott had met with Sarkisian outside parliament earlier in the day in an attempt to mediate Armenia’s ongoing conflict with neighboring Azerbaijan, and was on his way to Turkey when the siege began.
Witnesses said Sarkisian, 40, was engaged in a question-and-answer session with 70 to 80 legislators when the gunmen stormed the legislative chamber, methodically spraying gunfire in all directions.
As terrified lawmakers ducked under their seats, Unanyan approached Sarkisian at the podium and said, “Enough of drinking our blood.”
Sarkisian replied, “Everything is being done for you and your children.”
Unanyan then emptied an entire magazine at Sarkisian, witnesses said.
The assault came amidst progress in talks between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh – a disputed region where a war broke out in 1988.