Baku: rights defenders argue about sentences to Armenian militaries

The human rights defenders interviewed by the "Caucasian Knot" have diverged in their opinions regarding the sentences passed to Armenian militaries: some treat them to be adequate to the imputed crimes, while others treat the sentences to Mkrtchyan and Khosrovyan as excessively lenient and compared them with those passed to Azerbaijani oppositionists.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that on August 2, the Baku military court sentenced the Armenian militaries, Ludvig Mkrtchyan and Alyosha Khosrovyan, accused of torturing captured soldiers and civilians during the 1992-1994 Karabakh war, to 20 years in prison each.

Rasul Djafarov, the head of the Baku Human Rights Club, treats the verdict in the Mkrtchyan and Khosrovyan case as adequate to their imputed crimes.

"The guilt of the Armenian militaries has been proved by testimonies of their victims – the people they had tortured, who had identified their martyrs already during the preliminary investigation," Mr Djafarov told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent on August 2.

Arzu Abdulla, a member of the Committee for the Protection of Islamists' Rights, believes that the verdicts of the Azerbaijani courts against Armenian militaries are excessively "humane".

"Let's take the two Armenians convicted today (on August 2): they had used sophisticated methods of torture against Azerbaijani citizens who were in captivity. [...] And now they are sentenced to 20 years in prison – the same prison term was awarded to Talekh Bagirzade, the head of the "Muslim Unity" movement, who had committed no crimes, but was arrested on trumped-up charges," Mr Abdulla told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on August 3, 2021 at 05:20 am MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.