YEREVAN. – The general meaning of the Strasbourg Convention on the Transfer of Sentenced Persons is that these persons can serve their sentences in their countries, too. But by extraditing Ramil Safarov and his being released in Azerbaijan, the latter violated the Convention’s several articles, Armenian Analytical Centre on Globalization and Regional Cooperation Director, political scientist Stepan Grigoryan said during a press conference on Wednesday.   

In Grigoryan’s words, however, the process is not over for Hungary. The latter still has the right to demand from Azerbaijan to provide an answer as to the current state of the process. It even has the right to demand the return of Safarov, if he is not serving his sentence in Azerbaijan. 

The political analyst also recalled that the Convention was adopted in Strasbourg, France, in 1983, and Armenia and Azerbaijan joined it in 2001.

Armenian News-NEWS.am reported earlier that Ramil Safarov, a lieutenant in the Azerbaijani military, was extradited on August 31 from Hungary, where he was serving a life sentence—and with no expression of either regret or remorse—for the premeditated axe murder of Armenian lieutenant Gurgen Margaryan, in his sleep, during a NATO Partnership for Peace program in Budapest back in 2004.

As expected, Ramil Safarov’s return to Baku was welcomed, as was his act of murder, by the officials of president Ilham Aliyev’s government and much of Azerbaijani society, and the Azerbaijani president immediately granted him a pardon.

And Armenia’s President Serzh Sargsyan announced on August 31 that Armenia is suspending its diplomatic ties with Hungary.    

Photo by Sona Barseghyan