Human Rights Defender of Armenia Arman Tatoyan posted the following on his Facebook page:

“Yesterday, on December 31, 2020, the President of Azerbaijan, talking about Armenian servicemen being held in captivity in that country, declared that they aren’t prisoners of war. He also declared that they are detained and viewed them as terrorists.

As the Human Rights Defender of Armenia, I specifically that this and other statements are a gross violation of the post-war humanitarian process and the international requirements protecting human rights. The statement by the President of Azerbaijan also directly contradicts the requirement in point 8 of the trilateral statement signed on November 9, 2020 which concerns the exchange of prisoners of war/captives or persons who are in other way deprived of liberty.

The Armenian servicemen captured by Azerbaijani soldiers must be immediately released and returned to Armenia. This must be done immediately and without any precondition since they are prisoners of war according to their status.

During and after the war crimes, the Azerbaijani authorities have constantly violated the international requirements of human rights and humanitarian agreements by artificially delaying the return of prisoners of war/captives and not reporting the real number of prisoners of war/captives (during this whole process, the Azerbaijani authorities have continued torture and inhuman treatment, the targeted publication of videos showing torture and inhuman treatment, obstruction of exchange of the bodies of servicemen, etc.).

The studies and reports of the Office of the Human Rights Defender of Armenia confirmed that the aim of all this is to cause mental suffering to the families of the prisoners of war/captives, play with the Armenian public’s emotions and generate tension in Armenia.

The monitoring clearly confirms that, in the case of the Azerbaijani authorities, it is necessary to always act with specific guarantees that will ensure unobstructed implementation of their humanitarian agreements and inviolability of the international requirements of human rights.

Thus, I call the attention of the international community and particularly international organizations with the mandate to protect human rights to the mentioned statement by the President of Azerbaijan in order to rule out any violation of the humanitarian process and ensure strict compliance of the process with the international requirements of human rights.”