“This will Serve as a Guarantee for Armenia, that Azerbaijan won’t Take Likewise Steps Towards its Population”
Throughout military operations unleashed by Azerbaijan, the attacking side has violated a range of norms of international law. 12 year-old Vaghinak Grigoryan was killed from the fire of the adversary, two more children got injuries.
Photo showing atrocities by the Azerbaijanis in Talish was spread in the press: Varela Khalapyan and his wife have been shot and their ears have been cut. Marusia Khalapyan, born 1924, was also killed. On April 10 in the territory of Bash-Karvend 18 bodies of servicemen of NKR Defense army have been handed to the Armenian side; all the bodies have been mutilated and defamed. Cases of beheading of Armenian servicemen by the adversary are known as well.
Nikolay Baghdasaryan, advocate, introduced the existent mechanisms within international law. According to the advocate, two approaches are available within the international law: on the one hand, the state is exposed to liability, and on the other hand, exact persons, who have committed the crime.
“I’d like to focus on the second approach. There is International Criminal Court (ICC), which examines crime, including the one against humanity and military crime, which are scandalous or attached attention of the international community. That court was founded as a result of Nuremberg and Tokyo trials. The process was launched yet in 1945, however, it was frozen until 1998, when Roman status has been adopted, which entered into force in 2002. That is, ICC may examine cases regarding all types of crime, which have been planned by the Statute and took place since 2002. However, as you know, international courts are based on international accords and have certain features. One of them is the fact that it may examine only cases referring to crimes committed in the territories of the countries having joined the Statute, or infringement was committed towards the citizens, the state of which has also joined the Statute. ”
Here we face a technical issue. Neither Armenia, nor Azerbaijan jointed the Statute. In my assessment, if Armenia joined it, present-day crimes would be examined by the International Criminal Court, as RA citizens have suffered from that, and in case of not joining, we have to apply to the UNO Security Council, so that the latter applied to ICC. The process is as follows: Security Council applies to the ICC prosecutor, and the latter initiates proceedings.
Moreover, they directly provide proofs. “Investigators” function there, who collect evidence. The parties may also present their evidence. Then they may bring an accusation and launch prosecution against them. ICC may, as a result, define a charge to imprisonment up to 30 years. To my assessment, this is a process that would guarantee security for the Republic of Armenia, as when Azerbaijani officials know, they’re not punished for the crime, an atmosphere of impunity is being developed.
However, if they know, they’ll be punished for the crime, they’ll think of appearing before the court. I consider, this will be a guarantee, that Azerbaijan won’t take likewise steps against Armenia’s population,” Nikolay Baghdasaryan said. In his words, there is no any other international court that will implement such productive examination.
Private complaints may be submitted to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), however, the state is brought to responsibility, and in this case we may speak of recognition of violation of right and compensation. “I consider the right to human life has been violated, as Azerbaijan doesn’t implement proper examination to uncover the crime. That is, we may apply to the ECHR against Azerbaijan. However, it’s a lasting process and it may refer to compensations of relatives of the killed soldiers or those persons, property of which has suffered. They are different institutes,” the advocate said, adding that in case of applying to the ECHR, compensation may be received as an implication, but we won’t have any means to prevent repetition of likewise incidents.
According to N.Baghdasaryan, for the time being the priority is not that of getting compensations, although it’s a crucial issue as well, “However, I consider, it’s more important that persons committing crime were charged.”
Note, a criminal case has been launched at General Military Investigative Department of RA Investigative Committee, regarding violations enshrined in RA Criminal Code, Article 390, part 6—serious violations of international humanitarian norms during armed conflict against persons not immediately engaged in military actions. Numerous injuries, signs of mutilations and defamation of bodies of 18 Armenian servicemen have been recorded as a result of forensic examination. Touching upon this criminal case, the advocate mentioned that in case of examination, great attention should be paid to application of information technologies: taking photos and filming, so that, if necessary, the evidence was submitted to international courts and they had a legal force.
By Ofelya Hovhannisyan
