Rights commissioner visits detained Armenian armed group members
By Vafa Ismayilova
Human Rights Commissioner Sabina Aliyeva has visited the Armenian armed group members detained on Azerbaijani territory after the signing of the Karabakh peace deal in autumn 2020, the ombudsman office reported on May 20.
The report said that during the next unnoticed monitoring of the Justice Ministry's Justice Penitentiary Service, in compliance with the National Preventive Mechanism mandate, Sabina Aliyeva once again visited the members of the armed group.
The members of the armed group were settled by Armenia in the liberated areas of Azerbaijan, but detained as a part of the counter-measures for criminal acts threatening the lives and health of our civilians and military servicemen and handed over for the investigation being accused of committing terror acts, the report added.
To recap, the aforesaid people were detained as part of measures to counter their criminal and terror acts that killed four Azerbaijani servicemen and severely injured one civilian on Azerbaijani territory on 12-13 December 2020, a month after all hostilities ceased after the joint statement (Karabakh peace deal) signed by the Azerbaijani, Russian and Armenian leaders on November 10.
"During the tete-a-tete meeting with those persons, the ombudsman investigated the situation of ensuring their rights. The accused persons expressed their satisfaction with their detention conditions, nutrition, healthcare service, and treatment," the report added.
The ombudsman privately listened to all detainees, presented them legislative acts in their own language, and explained their rights.
The rights commissioner's ad-hoc report based on the outcomes of this monitoring was submitted to relevant international human rights organizations, the report said.
On May 19, Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Leyla Abdullayeva reiterated that "as agreed in the tripartite statement, and consistent with its obligations under international humanitarian law, Azerbaijan has released and repatriated all Armenians in its custody who were entitled to prisoner-of-war status".
In early May, showing goodwill, Azerbaijan set free three Armenian servicemen, who were disarmed in the Nagorno-Karabakh region after the signing of the Karabakh peace deal.
Earlier, Azerbaijan handed over more than 70 prisoners of war to Armenia, and Armenia returned 14 prisoners of war.
It should be noted that Armenia has failed to provide any information about more than 4,000 Azerbaijani citizens who went missing during the first Nagorno-Karabakh war in the early 1990s. Most of them were killed and buried in mass graves. One of these burials was found in Bashlibel village of Kalbajar region. At the same time, Armenia does not provide information about the Azerbaijani citizens who were in captivity during the first Nagorno-Karabakh war.
Armenia has also failed to provide Azerbaijan the maps of minefields in the Nagorno-Karabakh region that has resulted in the killing of dozens of civilians and military personnel.
On November 10, Baku and Yerevan signed a Moscow-brokered deal that brought an end to 44 days of fighting between Armenia and Azerbaijan. The Azerbaijani army declared a victory against the Armenian troops. The signed agreement obliged Armenia to withdraw its troops from the Azerbaijani lands that it has occupied since the early 1990s.
Before the signing of the deal, the Azerbaijani Army had liberated around 300 villages, settlements, city centres and historic Shusha city.
On January 11, the Azerbaijani, Russian and Armenian leaders signed the second statement since the end of the 44-day war. The newly-signed statement is set to implement clause 9 of the November 2020 statement related to the unblocking of all economic and transport communications in the region.
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