The treatment of Armenians under the overseeing of Azerbaijan is combined with deliberate actions that cause additional suffering to their families. Attorney and human rights activist Siranush Sahakyan, who is the Armenian prisoners of war’s representative at the European Court of Human Rights, told this to a press conference Friday, presenting the new special report prepared jointly with Arman Tatoyan, the former ombudsman of Armenia.

"In 2020, we had a case when photos of a soldier with his throat cut were posted on his social media [account]. We have had many cases when family members were taken out by taking their phones and photos revealing war crimes with the participation of that person or his comrades in arms were sent to [their] relatives.

"In this case, we see that there is a special trend [by Azerbaijan] to not reveal the fate of the [Armenian] missing persons. Cases were recorded when the Azerbaijani side clearly knows the location of the fallen [Armenian] serviceman, they have access to the body of the fallen serviceman, but they deliberately do not retrieve the body and do not hand [it] over to the family members. Also, they demonstratively approach, take photos, and disseminate the photos in the media. This is a clear evidence that the number of [Armenian] missing persons that we have since [the war in] 2020 is not the result of objective processes, but a deliberate [Azerbaijani] policy towards Armenians," said Sahakyan.

She added that in modern conditions it is almost impossible not to know the location of the dead bodies.

"Not revealing the fate of the missing is just revenge in response to the existence of the missing on the Azerbaijani side back in the 1990s," said Sahakyan.