Armenian soldiers die more in non-combat conditions than at frontline
By Rashid Shirinov
Majority of Armenian young men perceive the Armenian army as the place of serving the “sentence,” and this is true for both conscripts and contract soldiers. Many of those who conclude a contract with the Armenian Armed Forces, cannot terminate it in future.
For instance, when an Armenian contract soldier Edgar Hakobyan several times tried to terminate his contract with the Army, he was beaten and tortured. All this is called “explanatory work” on the part of the commanders in the Armenian army.
Having served in a military unit located in the Armenia-occupied territories of Azerbaijan, Hakobyan repeatedly complained about inhuman conditions in the unit. In the first months of service, he contracted a kidney disease and could no longer carry out combat duty. He several times reported this in writing to the commander of the military unit. The latter, however, tore up the letter and tried to forcibly send Hakobyan to the combat positions, threatening him with court.
The soldier was fired after all, when he ran away and came in Yerevan to complain to the Defense Ministry. But not many of those who serve in the Armenian armed forces are so lucky. The Peace Dialogue organization has prepared a report on the deaths in the Armenian army in 2010-2017.
It reads that over these years, 235 servicemen of the Armenian Armed Forces died due to ceasefire violations, while the death of even more Armenian soldiers, 296 people, occurred mainly due to internal factors. These include the atmosphere of impunity in military units, murders, suicides due to arbitrariness, as well as accidents by negligence and recruitment of young men with health problems.
Over the last eight years, there were 56 cases of murders, 69 suicides, 90 deaths by accident, 39 due to health problems, 16 because of violation of safety rules, while 9 deaths occurred due to inaction of commanders and negligence. The Peace Dialogue employees have still not been able to establish the causes of deaths of 17 other soldiers.
It is evident from the report that after 2013, the number of murders, suicides, deaths by accident, from health problems, negligence, etc. has increased parallel to the increase in the number of deaths due to ceasefire violation.
The Peace Dialogue noted that these high death rates should have caused concern of the relevant official circles. However, despite the constant appeals and proposals of the representatives of civil society, the action plan for the National Strategy on Human Rights protection in 2017-2019 includes no actions aimed at reducing non-combat losses.
Hence, it becomes clear that the Armenian government and the Defense Ministry are as always indifferent to the arbitrariness reigning in the Armenian armed forces for many years. Therefore, the number of deaths in non-combat conditions is likely to increase in the near future.
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Rashid Shirinov is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @RashidShirinov
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