Siranush Sahakyan, head of the Center for International and Comparative Law, representative of the interests of Armenian prisoners at the ECHR, informed NEWS.am that he has information from Ruben Vardanyan’s family that he was transferred to the Umbak prison complex in Baku’s Gharadagh district.

The last statements of Mrs. Sahakyan and Ruben Vardanyan, addressed first to the human rights defenders of Azerbaijan and then to Armenia, were disturbing. Now that the activities of the Red Cross have been stopped and the judicial farce is over, from which at least from time to time photographs were published and one could make judgments based on their appearance, what information is there about the condition and conditions of detention of him and the other prisoners?

The situation is disturbing and worrying. I have information from Ruben Vardanyan’s family that he was transferred from the investigative detention center under the National Security Service to the penitentiary under the Ministry of Justice, the Umbak prison complex in the Gharadagh district of Baku. According to our information, other Armenian prisoners were also transferred to this facility.

Nothing is known about the conditions he and the other captives were held in the new facility. There is no transparency in this issue either, the guarantees established by the norms of international law are violated. in particular, they did not inform the family members in advance where and when they are moving and what changes will be made in terms of routine and calls. There is no reliable information about their health, access to medical care, basic living conditions. You know that since September of last year, at the request of the government of Azerbaijan, ICRC’s activities in that country were suspended, but once after that, in December of last year, the Geneva office of ICRC managed to visit and visit the Armenian prisoners. After that we don’t have any exact information about their condition.

I can only say that at the moment, phone calls with family members are kept, some information is transferred during these private conversations, but there is no structure that collects and records information through direct observation, condition, monitoring, and this creates an information vacuum.

Ruben Vardanyan also said that until now the verdict has not been provided in any language, which, in fact, hinders the appeal process. In this regard, do you have any news, if the judgments are not issued within the specified time, does it mean that they cannot apply even to, for example, the European Court?

The ECHR obliged Azerbaijan to provide the prisoners’ verdicts by August 31. This decision can be an incentive for providing these documents.

At the same time, this does not mean that Azerbaijan can block the way to international courts by not issuing verdicts. On the contrary, in such a situation, we can record that the domestic legal measures do not work effectively, and in such conditions, the calculation of the deadlines for applying to the ECHR starts from the moment of the actual receipt of judicial acts.

It should be noted that at the moment the ECHR has become an important link, because some documents, including those concerning the health condition of the prisoners, are obtained thanks to the court’s activities. As is known, Azerbaijan submitted such information to the court back in January, but in February presented a new motion, asking the ECHR to eliminate the measures of security applied to Armenian prisoners and to stop the obligation to submit reports.

We have submitted a position regarding this petition, arguing that the immediate threats to the lives and health of the captives continue to exist. Moreover, the lack of information itself is a cause for serious concern and can be considered as a circumstance involving the risk of torture. In such circumstances, the continued involvement of the ECHR remains crucial.

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