ECHR demands that Azerbaijan present information on 62 Armenian POWs
YEREVAN, December 22. /ARKA/. After meeting with the relatives of 62 Armenian servicemen surrounded and captured by Azerbaijani armed forces in the village of Khtsaberd in Hadrut district of Nagorno-Karabakh on December 18, Armenia's representative to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) Yeghishe Kirakosyan prepared an application to ask the ECHR to apply an interim measure against Azerbaijan regarding 53 servicemen.
Kirakosyan said in a Facebook post that his application with the required evidence was submitted to the ECHR, while the application for the other nine servicemen was submitted by their lawyers.
"On December 21, the ECHR satisfied one of the applications submitted by the Armenian government, demanding that the Azerbaijani government provide information and medical documents regarding Armenian prisoners of war by December 28, as well as inform it about the timing of their exchange," Kirakosyan said.
According to the commander of the Russian peacekeeping contingent, Lieutenant-General Rustam Muradov, official Baku confirmed the reports that 62 Armenians were captured in Khtsaberd. Armenian MPs Nazeli Baghdasaryan and Sofia Hovsepyan conveyed to Rustamov the list of prisoners by name for conveying to the Azerbaijani side.
On December 14, 44 Armenian prisoners of war and other captivates were brought home by a Russian military plane from Azerbaijan and 12 Azerbaijani citizens were flown to Baku.
Armenia and Azerbaijan earlier agreed to "all for all" swap of POWs. The exact data on the number of Armenians captives or soldiers gone missing during the war in Artsakh is not known.
From September 27 to November 9, Azerbaijani armed forces, backed by Turkey and foreign mercenaries and terrorists, attacked Nagorno-Karabakh along the entire front line using rocket and artillery weapons, heavy armored vehicles, military aircraft and prohibited types of weapons such as cluster bombs and phosphorus weapons.
On November 9, the leaders of the Russia, Azerbaijan and Armenia signed a statement on the cessation of all hostilities in Artsakh. According to the document, the parties stopped at where they were at that time. The town of Shushi, the districts of Agdam, Kelbajar and Lachin were handed over to Azerbaijan, with the exception of a 5-kilometer corridor connecting Karabakh with Armenia.
A Russian peacekeeping contingent has been deployed along the contact line in Karabakh and along the Lachin corridor. Internally displaced persons and refugees are returning to Karabakh and adjacent regions, prisoners of war, hostages and other detained persons and bodies of the dead are being exchanged.--0-
