PACE rapporteur briefed on Azerbaijan’s gross violations of Armenian POWs’ rights

The Armenian representative to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) on Friday briefed a senior Council of Europe official on the reported abuses against the Armenian prisoners of war in Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh).

Yeghishe Kirakosyan received Paul Gavala (Iceland), a Rapporter of the PACE Committee on Migration, Refugees and Displaced Persons in Yerevan, as part of the ongoing negotiations over the post-war situation in Karabakh.  

The meeting with the delegation, including also Mark Nevil, the Chair of the PACE Migration Commission, Paruyr Hovhannisyan, the Permanent Representative of Armenia to the Council of Europe, and Ruben Rubinyan, the Chairman of the National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Foreign Relations, focused also on the situation of the displaced person from Karabakh.                                                                                                       
Highlighting the urgency of the POWs’ repatriation, Kirakosyan called the guests’ attention to the Azerbaijani authorities’ gross violations of the international norms proposing protection for captives. He was, in particular, concerned to note that the Azerbaijani authorities artificially protract and politicize the detainees’ return, misrepresenting them as terrorists or saboteurs.

Kirakosyan further addressed the detained persons’ concerns and property rights, elaborating particularly on Armenia’s recent Inter-State Application to the ECHR (covering also the rights of the internally displaced, as well as extended evidence of crimes). He also briefed the delegation on the appeal against Turkey over the recruitment, and transportation of Syrian mercenaries to Azerbaijan, as well as the military assistance offered to that country during the war against Karabakh.