A French journalist gave details about the accusations of espionage against two Frenchmen by the Azerbaijani authorities.

Leo Nicolian, a French military correspondent of Armenian and Lebanese descent, announced the name of one of these arrested French citizens on X, former Twitter.

"Martin Ryan was arrested in Baku on December 4. Martin Ryan, CEO of the [Baku-based company] Merkorama LLC, is accused of espionage. He was manipulated by the 2 expelled agents of the DGSE [(Directorate-General for External Security) of France], who obligated him in secret collaboration. Secret negotiations are underway,” the aforesaid journalist wrote.

At the end of December, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MF) of Azerbaijan declared two employees of the French embassy in Baku persona non grata and ordered them to leave the country within 48 hours, reports the press service of the MFA. The latter noted that on December 26, they summoned the French ambassador to Azerbaijan, Anne Bouillon, to whom "a strong complaint was submitted regarding the actions of two members of the French embassy, which were incompatible with their diplomatic status and contradicted the 1961 Vienna Convention on diplomatic relations.”

The Azerbaijani authorities have not yet made an official statement regarding the aforementioned arrests.