YEREVAN. – Suspending diplomatic relations with Hungary was Armenia’s right, German Ambassador Reiner Morell said during a press conference on Wednesday.    

“That was Armenia’s independent decision, just as a possible decision to restore ties,” the diplomat stressed, and recalled that Germany and Europe did not condemn Armenia’s decision to suspend relations.

Ambassador Morell reiterated that Ramil Safarov’s extradition and subsequent release was unusual from the emotional perspective. “[This] Move was absurd. The end results were exaggerated in Azerbaijan. It is comprehensible that this was to receive such reaction in Armenia,” the German diplomat noted.   

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.    

Ramil Safarov’s pardoning is condemned by virtually all international organizations.   

Photo by Sona Barseghyan