TURKEY SAYS UNFAIRLY TARGETED BY ARMENIANS OVER AZERBAIJANI OFFICER PARDONING
Today’s Zaman
Sept 6 2012
Turkey
Turkey has complained about what it said “unfair targeting” by Armenian
diaspora groups in the United States in the case of pardoning of an
Azerbaijani military officer.
Turkish Foreign Ministry spokesman Selcuk Unal said in a statement
that Ankara is astonished in watching the accusations by the Armenian
diaspora.
The tensions between Armenia and Azerbaijan rose sharply last week
after Hungary repatriated convicted Azerbaijani military officer
Ramil Safarov, who had been sentenced to life imprisonment for the
2004 axe murder of Armenian Lt. Gurgen Makarian while both were in
Hungary on a NATO language-training course.
Hungary said Azerbaijan promised that Safarov would serve his sentence
in a local prison, but he received a presidential pardon hours after
returning and later was promoted from lieutenant to major.
Unal said Turkey is not part of the process in any stage and that these
“groundless” efforts is a new black propaganda of “ill-intentioned
circles.”
The Nagorno-Karabakh region of Azerbaijan and some adjacent territory
have been under the control of Armenian troops and local ethnic
Armenian forces since a 1994 cease-fire ended a six-year war that
killed an estimated 30,000 people and drove about 1 million from
their homes.
An outraged Armenian President Serzh Sarksyan broke diplomatic
relations with Hungary and said Armenia was willing to resume fighting
against Azerbaijan.
During his trial in Budapest, Safarov claimed that the Nagorno-Karabakh
conflict was at the root of his actions and that he killed Markarian
while the victim was sleeping after the Armenian repeatedly provoked
and ridiculed him.
From: A. Papazian