During 2021, a total of 2,150 criminal cases were investigated for the crimes in the 44-day Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) war; and by the end of the year, 800 people had been prosecuted. Prosecutor General Artur Davtyan stated this during Friday’s meeting of the Standing Committee on State and Legal Affairs of the National Assembly of Armenia, presenting the report on the 2021 activities of the Prosecutor General’s Office.
“Fifty-five people have already been sued in those criminal cases; we have relevant verdicts. (…) the investigation of the remaining cases continues,” Davtyan added, in particular.
The Prosecutor General assured that they are diligent in revealing the most objective truth in those cases and in bringing to account everyone who committed criminal violations and caused criminal violations due to the painful outcome of the war, or led to that outcome.
As for the crimes committed by the military and political leadership of Azerbaijan, Artur Davtyan noted that the picture documented by objective evidence is that the violations of the international humanitarian law by the military and political leadership of Azerbaijan and its servicemen were deliberately targeted in specific cases, settlements were targeted, and civilians were targeted. Also, civilians were killed, the rules of war were violated, prohibited weapons were used, Armenian historical and cultural treasures were targeted and destroyed, and acts of violence, torture, and murder were carried out.
The Prosecutor General of Armenia noted that the objective facts obtained in the criminal case clearly testify that since June-July 2020, well-known terrorist groups have been recruiting mercenaries from the northern parts of Syria, these mercenaries were transferred unobstructed to Turkey through the Turkish-Syrian state border, and from Turkey where they were transferred to Azerbaijan where their military training was carried out.
“They underwent specially trained to fight in the mountainous areas, they were instructed to kill, torture the civilian population. During the [44-day] war [in the fall of 2020], our armed forces had succeeded in finding and arresting two such mercenaries, who presented in detail everything I talked about,” the Prosecutor General of Armenia stated.
He noted that both of the above-mentioned mercenaries were sentenced to life imprisonment, and at present, there are about 60 representatives of the Azerbaijani military and political leadership who have been prosecuted.