Azernews.Az

BAKU - Azerbaijani officials have dismissed foreign media reports claiming that two Lebanese terrorists were among the dozen criminals recently extradited to Iran.

"All of the twelve prisoners we handed over to Iran are Iranian citizens and there were no Lebanese nationals among them," Justice Ministry official Zaver Gafarov told Radio Liberty.

Azerbaijan extradited 12 Iranian convicts to the neighboring country on August 11. The 11 men and one woman had been convicted over crimes including drug trafficking and illegal entry into Azerbaijan.

The foreign media reports claimed, however, that two of the inmates handed over to Iran are Lebanese nationals seized in 2008 on charges of an attempt to stage an explosion at the Israeli embassy in Baku.

The reports said that the two - Najimaddin Ali Huseyn and Karaki Ali Mahammad - were sentenced to 15 years in prison by Azerbaijan’s Grave Crimes Court in October 2009. During the detention, the Lebanese nationals reportedly had forged Iranian passports. Investigators have established that the two were trained by Sepah, Hizbollah and Al Qaeda groups’ leaders and sent to Azerbaijan to carry out attacks on the Israeli embassy and on the Gabala radar station, a mammoth Soviet-era facility leased by Russia in northern Azerbaijan.