Regnum, Russia
Aug 3, 2006

Karabakh human rights activist: "There are no Azerbaijani prisoners
of war in Nagorno Karabakh"

"The Azerbaijani authorities have been exaggerating the subject
of Azerbaijani prisoners of war in Karabakh captivity to conceal
the true number of its Army losses in the war imposed upon Nagorno
Karabakh. Instead of cooperating with Armenian and Azerbaijani NGOs
in solving this humanitarian problem, Baku is politicizing it,"
Karen Ohanjanyan, head of Helsinki Initiative ’92 organization,
commenting on a report by TURAN news agency, which says that allegedly
"Azerbaijani prisoners of war are being exploited in tunnels of gold
mines in Kelbajar District."

"Since May 12, 1995, there has been no prisoners of war and hostages
in Nagorno Karabakh. All of them were extradited to Azerbaijan. Today
there are only separate cases of Azerbaijani servicemen becoming
prisoners of war because of their attempts to carry out subversive
activity, however, Nagorno Karabakh authorities immediately inform
Stepanakert Office of the International Red Cross Committee and in
two or three months these prisoners are extradited to the Azeri side
with the Red Cross assistance," Karen Ohanjanyan stressed.

It is worth mentioning, recently, a regional conference on issues of
missing people with participation of Armenian, Azerbaijani, Georgian
and Nagorno Karabakh representatives initiated in the framework
of The Yellow Tulips Project with support of The Interchurch Peace
Council (the Netherlands) was held in the Nagorno Karabakh capital,
Stepanakert. The reporters spoke on carious aspects of the missing
people problem, gave a brief on history of cooperation of the Helsinki
Citizens Assembly in South Caucasus, role of mass media in solving
the problems of missing, attitudes of the governmental institutions
to the problem of missing.