MOSCOW. - The Russian Embassy in Baku continues to closely watch the situation round blogger Alexander Lapshin, the official spokesperson for the Russian MFA, Maria Zakharova, said Wednesday.   

In her words, the investigation on his case is currently continuing (the deadline for the investigation has been extended to July 15). “He doesn’t complain of detention conditions. The administration of the pre-trial detention facility was notified on the concern of the Russian citizen’s relatives regarding his health deterioration. Upon the imperative request of the Embassy, Lapshin passed a medical examination. I will not elaborate on the conclusion. I can [only] say that we control the situation. The Embassy is in constant touch with the attorney and relatives of the Russian citizen,” she noted. 

After his visits to Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) in 2011 and 2012, Israeli Russian blogger and journalist Alexander Lapshin was “blacklisted” by Azerbaijan.

In June 2016, however, he paid a visit to Azerbaijan--but with a Ukrainian passport--and, subsequently, he published several articles criticizing the Azerbaijani authorities.

Afterward, Azerbaijan issued an international search for this famous blogger. On December 15, 2016, Lapshin was detained in the Belarusian capital city of Minsk, and based on this search.

On January 26 of the current year, the Minsk city court dismissed the blogger's appeal of the Belarusian General Prosecutor's Office decision to extradite him to Azerbaijan.

On February 7, the Supreme Court of Belarus dismissed the appeals that were filed into this case, and upheld the aforesaid decision by the General Prosecutor’s Office.

And on the evening of the same day, Belarus extradited Alexander Lapshin to the Azerbaijani capital city of Baku, where he was taken into custody.