DIVERSIONS FOR AND AGAINST FORMER RESIDENCE
Monday, 22 September 2014 17:30
SinÑ~Ae the achievement of the cease-fire (May 1994) in the
Azerbaijani-Karabakh conflict zone, numerous incidents have taken
place on the Line of Contact. For obvious reasons, the reactions to
them were different in the Armenian and Azerbaijani mass media.
There is no doubt that Azerbaijan has always been the instigator of
border incidents, and it has repeatedly been proved by the undisputed
evidence presented by the NKR Defense Ministry.
In this context, distinctive is another penetration by a
reconnaissance-subversive group into the NKR Shahumian region from
the Azerbaijani territory in this July. Both the official and public
media sources of Azerbaijan kicked up a fuss in an attempt to create
the impression as if the persons, who had penetrated into the NKR
territory, were shepherds-natives of Karvachar, and they just went
to visit the graves of their relatives.
But, is it really so? Surely, the comments by the Azerbaijani party
are alleged, because if the matter was to go and visit the graves
of their relatives, then they could do it by appealing to the NKR
authorities, which they didn’t do. Simple logic suggests that the
border of a country involved in a conflict cannot be secretly crossed,
even for such purposes. Therefore, the goal of the illegal crossing of
the border and the penetration into the NKR territory was absolutely
different.
What was their true goal and who were, in fact, the members of the
group, which violated the border? We tried to find answers to these
questions by studying the publications and videos available in the
mass media and at the Internet.
At the same time, considering that the law enforcement bodies of
the NKR have initiated a criminal case on this fact, which is still
at the stage of investigation, we tried to refrain from expressing
biased opinions in order not to violate the principle of presumption
of innocence.
First of all, let’s refer to the official information at the Internet,
which reads as follows: “As a result of the operational-intelligence
activities undertaken by the corresponding departments of the NKR
Defense Ministry, the NKR National Security Service, and the NKR
Police, the following citizens of the Azerbaijani Republic, who had
illegally crossed the state border, were discovered and detained
in the NKR Shahumian region: Shahbaz Jalaloghlu Guliyev (born in
1968), armed with a factory-made submachine gun of “AKMC” type and
7.62-mm caliber (number “TD 2042”), with the appropriate silencer,
a factory-made pistol of “Ã~_Ã~” type and 9-mm caliber (number
“Ã’Ã~P 0033”), with the appropriate silencer, 2 factory-made “ä-1”
hand combat fragmentation grenades, and other ammunition; Dilham
Gardashkhanoghlu Askerov (born in 1960), armed with a factory-made
submachine gun of “AKMC” type and 7.62-mm caliber (number “TF 7373”),
with the appropriate silencer, a factory-made pistol of “Ã~_Ã~” type
and 9-mm caliber (number “CH 3478″), with the appropriate silencer,
and other ammunition; the third member of the group, the information
about which is being specified, resisted while being detained, as a
result of which he was liquidated.
The discovered facilities were used for reconnaissance-sabotage and
espionage activities.
Based on the preliminary materials collected on the fact of the illegal
crossing of the state border, a criminal case has been initiated.
Shakhbaz Jalaloghlu Guliyev (born in 1968) and Dilham
Gardashkhanoghlu Askerov (born in 1960) are detained”
(www.genprocnk.ðm/2011-02-18-09-21-12/423-2014-07-15 -10-44-08).
Then, the same source reports, in particular, that as a result of
the search operations conducted by the law enforcement bodies of the
NKR, the body of resident of Shahumian region’s Nor Erkej village
Smbat Tsakanyan, born in 1997, who went missing on July 4, 2014,
was discovered near the former village of Shaplar, the Shahumian
region; according to the forensic medical examination, there was
a lot of gunshot wounds on his body. According to the preliminary
investigations, Smbat Tsakanyan was kidnapped by citizens of the
Azerbaijani Republic Shakhbaz Guliyev, Dilham Askerov, and the
third person who resisted while being detained by the corresponding
departments of the NKR law enforcement bodies and was liquidated on
the spot; the information about his personality is being specified.
They illegally penetrated into the NKR
territory to implement espionage actions (see:
www.genprocnk.ðm/2011-02-18-09-21-12/426-2014-07-17-12-54-09).
As we can see, the group penetrated into the NKR territory to carry out
reconnaissance-sabotage and espionage activities and killed an underage
civilian. In addition, according to the operational information of
the NKR Police, while in Karvachar, the noted three persons laid an
ambush and killed officer of the NKR Defense Army Sargis Abrahamian
and wounded Karine Davidian, who was in the same car together with
Abrahamyan, with a submachine gun. Fortunately, she survived and gave
her testimonies, as a victim, to the investigation bodies.
We have managed to find some interesting facts from the biographies of
Dilham Gardashkhanoghlu Askerov and Shahbaz Jalaloghlu Guliyev. The
information about the third person, Hasan Hasanov, is relatively
insufficient, but the available materials give an insight into his
personality.
Let’s start with Dilham Askerov, whose “Karabakh heroic deeds”
are described even in a book published in Baku. The author of the
book is military journalist Ziyaddin Shuraoghlu Ismailov, who has
closely been familiar with Askerov since the Azerbaijani-Karabakh
war. The documentary story is called “Do not go alone to Kalbajar,
father” and contains interesting information about Dilham Askerov –
during both his participation in the war and implementation of the
sabotage-espionage activities in the NKR territory in the postwar
period. We will return to the book in details a bit later, but for
now let’s familiarize briefly with Dilham Gardashkhanoghlu Askerov’s
biography provided in the book.
He was born on September 30, 1960 in Norabak village (former
Garagoyunlu), the Vardenis region of Armenia, got a secondary school
education, worked as a driver. He was not previously convicted, has
a residence permit in the town of Ganja, the Azerbaijani Republic,
but before his arrest in the NKR he actually lived in Shamkhor region’s
Seyfali village. He is registered as Azeri by nationality, but everyone
knows him as a Kurd. During the Artsakh war, he was known by his “Kurd”
nickname; he gave the name of Kurdoglu to one of his four sons and
the name of Kurdani – to his daughter. His second wife Firuza is also
Kurd by nationality. His family moved to Karvachar region’s Shaplar
village when he was 6 years old, and he lived there until 1978. He
participated in the Azerbaijani-Karabakh war, and after the war,
he periodically left for the Russian Federation for earning. He was
recruited by the special services of Azerbaijan in 2005.
This is written by the author of the aforementioned book, Ziyaddin
Ismailov. Being familiar with Dilham Askerov since the war, when
periodically preparing reports for the Azerbaijani mass media, he
always admired Askerov’s courage. “Brave, courageous, physically
robust, has the ability to properly assess the situation, simple and
loyal – thanks to these qualities, Dilham was respected and honored
in his environment”, Ismailov writes, noting that during the war,
when the Armenians heard his voice on the radio, they turned the air
blue, and he was happy to anger the Armenians.
The book “Do not go alone to Kelbajar, father” consists of several
parts, which are full of episodes of Dilham Askerov’s “heroic past”.
Noteworthy, in particular, are the passages concerning the war period.
Thus, we learn from the book that in May 1992, Dilham Askerov received
military training at the training center of Garaheybat, not far from
Baku, after which he was appointed commander of raid intelligence group
#773. Along with the well-known group of Etibar Mamedov, they received
military training, but the students of the center, chaired by General
Kerim Mustafayev, could not participate in the “military activities
for the defense of Shushi” on May 8, 1992, as those days, the students
of the training center got… food poisoning. After the recovery, the
raid teams finally went to the front line. In Zangelan, Kubatlu, and
Lachin the locals met Dilham and others with flowers, invited to their
houses and entertained the saviors. As the author wrote in the book,
the road was full of Azerbaijani refugees leaving their homes with
frightened faces. Dilham Askerov managed to get a foothold at one of
the Lachin heights and to implement various subversive-intelligence
activities. However, it was impossible to prevent the Armenians’
attacks, because, as the author wrote, the Azeri commanders turned
to be coward and incompetent, and the local population was in panic.
There is an excerpt in the book about the military operation conducted
by the 773rd sabotage group in the Hadrut region, during which the
saboteurs, while in ambush, killed five Armenians, including a woman.
They were civilians from the Hadrut region. Dilham Askerov’s group
mined the road leading to Hadrut and retreated, for which it was
praised by the commander. Z. Ismailov described the details of the
military operations, carried out in the same area, also in “Part 4”
of the book. It happened in mid-August 1992, when the Azerbaijani Army,
through the fault of brigade commander Isa Gasimov and other geniuses
(underlined by the author of the book), suffered heavy losses.
Somehow, Ismailov presented the actions attributed to Dilham Askerov
against the background of Azerbaijani commanders’ mediocrity. The
likes and dislikes of the author in contrast become holistic in the
descriptions of the military operations, emphasizing still more that
the material is ordered. And it becomes clear from the following
pages of the book who ordered it and why.
Though funny, but also remarkable is the description of the military
operation conducted in Karvachar. Once again, the group went for
intelligence. It had to spend the night under the rocks. In the
morning, one of the soldiers, alarmed, woke Dilham Askerov, saying that
the Armenians, backed by a tank, had besieged them. It turned out that
the tank was a mere shadow of the cliff under the morning sunlight. And
Dilham began to taunt the soldier, advising him not to fear the enemy.
According to the author, Dilham Askerov also participated in the
“liberation of Kelbajar” in winter 1994. “Then it was snowing and it
was cold. Whether due to the commanders’ amateurism or due to traitors,
the military unions of our army were sieged in the vicinity of the
village of Lev and suffered heavy losses. And those, who survived and
fled to the mountains, then died of cold and hunger, or were captured
by the Armenians. It is difficult to say how many dead bodies were
left in the war areas. No one can say whose remains they were, as the
bodies were ripped up by raptorial birds…”, we read these words of
regret in the book.
Z. Ismailov described in details the “Karvachar journey”, with the
logical narration of the scenes. Surely, the author could get much
of the information from the shots done by Dilham Askerov, which,
for some reason approved by the special services of Azerbaijan,
were placed at the Internet, and some of the shots were even shown
on the Azerbaijani television. These shots, however, contain not
nostalgic feelings, but a specially elaborated ideology concocted in
the political kitchen of Baku.
Both the materials of the book and Askerov’s shots testify that
the “target” of the shooting was not the paths or the gorges of
the native village familiar from the childhood, but the objects of
strategic importance. Dilham Askerov and his entourage, among them
Shahbaz Guliyev, even had the courage to shoot the military posts,
military equipment, soldiers, and the movement of the equipment. / See:
The reflections behind the scenes
are worth of attention, an excerpt of which we are giving in details
in order to make the true goal of the shooting clear. “They have
organized everything well. Instead, we are waiting for the decision
of the OSCE and believe that the lands will be returned to us. If they
are going to return, then why have they founded a cemetery here? Here
is their cemetery, look. Tonight, I have approached Keychay. If I
cross this mountain, then I will find myself in the territory of
Basargechar (Vardenis is meant – ed.). It was impossible to go back
along the same road, I would have faced many obstacles, so I changed
my route and went in the direction of the Karabakh mountains… Do
you see how deserted they are? I think they are completely deserted,
though sometimes grazing cows or sheep are seen. Look, an Armenian is
shepherding the sheep over there. It means that the area is familiar
to the Armenians, and they know where to do that. In these mountains,
they graze the cattle stolen from the Kelbajar people. If we do not
stop all this, then it will be much harder to do it. Again, it will
be very difficult to do it later. See the mountains are deserted,
nobody lives there, and we should take advantage of this. We should
bring our soldiers here along the path I have passed, and not 5, 10,
100, 200, 500, or 1000, but 50,000 people. We should bring them and
hide in the mountains. This is possible to do in summer or in autumn,
and then we’ll attack the Armenians… In the middle, there is an
Armenian position, through which, if desired, we can lead hundreds
of armed people. The area is so empty that you can do what you want –
shoot, sing, or keep cattle, and nobody will know about it. Probably
our officers and soldiers will find time, watch these shots, and take
the appropriate decision”.
Karvachar, however, is not only a “shooting platform” for the border
violators. Dilham Askerov, together with his friend Hidayat, took
hostage two Armenians. This episode is described in “Part 5”. They
met two Armenian beekeepers – father and son – near the village of
Beyurbin. Threatening with a machine gun, Dilham Askerov asked them
where Armenians kept Azerbaijani captives. The younger replied that
he had seen about thirty Azerbaijani captives in Vardenis and stated
his readiness to go and bring the person they needed. Dilham Askerov
and Hidayat did not believe him and took them hostage. On the way,
the young man managed to escape, and the enraged saboteurs killed
his father.
The documentary book of Ziyaddin Ismailov “Do not go alone to
Kelbajar, father” and the materials placed in different time at the
Internet, as well as the video camera taken while neutralizing the
subversive-intelligence group thus testify that Dilham Askerov has
repeatedly crossed the state border of Artsakh. Let us try to restore
the chronology of violating the border.
Thus, in June 1998, together with his relative Hidayat Goyushov (native
of Karvachar – ed.), he crossed the NKR border, penetrated into the
Shahumian region, and took pictures with ‘Zenit’ camera. The next trip
was made in June 2005 with Shahbaz Guliyev. Then the special services
of Azerbaijan gave them a video camera, and Dilham Askerov and Shahbaz
Guliyev made shots in the town of Karvachar and in different places
of the NKR Shahumian region. Another violation of the border took
place in 2007. Prior to that, in 2006, Dilham Askerov met in Russia
a refugee from Karvachar Vagif Huseynov, and together they decided to
go to Karvachar, which they did in September 2007. Frames of this trip
are also available at the Internet ().
And the “Karvachar journey”, with the direct maintenance by
representative of the Azerbaijani special services Hasan Hasanov, took
place in June 2014 and was prevented by the measures taken jointly
by the NKR law enforcement bodies. Hasan Hasanov was born in Jabrail
region’s Mehidli village, graduated from the military academy, and had
the corresponding dan of black belt of eastern martial arts. Hasanov
participated in several acts of sabotage undertaken by the armed
forces of Azerbaijan, including in his native village of Mehidli.
During the arrest of Shahbaz Guliyev and Dilham Askerov, he resisted
the corresponding units of the NKR law enforcement bodies and was
liquidated on the spot.
Now let’s present some information related to Shahbaz Guliyev’s
biography, and again from the book “Do not go alone to Kelbajar,
father”.
He was born in 1968 in the village of Kafanli, the Mir-Bashir
region of the Azerbaijani Republic. He has an incomplete secondary
education, is married, and is Azeri by nationality. He has no previous
convictions. He lives in the Perm region of the Russian Federation.
He met with Dilham Askerov in 1992 in Lachin. They served in the
same platoon until Dilham Askerov became a battalion commander. He
deserted from the further military service and moved to the Russian
city of Khabarovsk, and from there – to the Perm region. In 2002,
he met by chance Dilham Askerov in Perm, but didn’t get in touch
with him. Two years later, he met Dilham Askerov again and could
not refrain from communicating with him. Having restored the mutual
confidence, they decided to go together to Karvachar, allegedly,
to search for gold and to do the shooting, for which they had to be
paid. On their return to Azerbaijan, in June 2005, they crossed the
NKR state border through Dashkesan and penetrated into the Shahumian
region, where they did secret shooting. Once again, along with Hasan
Hasanov, Dilham Askerov and Shahbaz Guliyev penetrated into the
NKR territory in late June, 2014. This time, they were armed with
special equipment and ammunition. This was the last operation of the
reconnaissance-sabotage group…
Yet during the Azerbaijani-Karabakh war, when the 773rd raid group
was in Jabrail and performed specific tasks, a special telecast was
prepared about it, which was shown even on the Russian television. It
was called “The punitive detachment of Ganja”.In his book, Ziyaddin
Ismailov proudly wrote about it, pointing out the cruelty of Dilham
Askerov and his comrades-in-arms, based on reliable facts. In the
book, in particular, it can be seen in the description of the events
in Maragha, where the Armenian pogroms are described by the author
with undisguised pride. Shahbaz Guliyev, a native of the village of
Kafanli, the Mir-Bashir region bordering Maragha, also participated in
these pogroms. War is war, but over 20 years later, in the conditions
of ceasefire, two major members of the group tried to “remember their
glorious past”, repeatedly violating the border of the state, which
is in conflict with Azerbaijan, to do shooting in this country and,
at the same time, to kill the local civilians.
The persistent efforts of the Azerbaijani press to present its
citizens, accused of espionage, as peaceful shepherds are absolutely
groundless. On the contrary, attention is attracted by the fact that
the camcorder, seized from the subversive group, contained a complete
record of the interrogation of the Armenian POW, Hagop Indzhigulyan,
by the Azeri special services, which Hasan Hasanov and others simply
forgot to delete. Among the videos, there are other operational surveys
also indicating who the real owner of the video camera is. At the
same time, it becomes clear who were Dilham Askerov, Shahbaz Guliyev,
and Hasan Hasanov “cloaked in the shepherd mantles”…
The deeds of Dilham Gardashkhanoghlu Askerov and Shahbaz Jalaloghlu
Guliyev are qualified by the investigation bodies as the gravest
crimes, and if the court finds them guilty, they will suffer a just
and severe punishment.
Svetlana KHACHATRIAN
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
