Azerbaijani Spy Scandal Leaves Trail Of Dead Suspects



Ron Synovitz
Azerbaijan -- Azeri servicemen guard their position at the frontline
with the self-defense army of Nagorno-Karabakh in Azerbaijan, April
29, 2016.


Within days of being swept up in a wave of arrests on espionage
charges last month, at least four Azerbaijani soldiers and a retired
military officer died in custody. The circumstances of their deaths
are shrouded in secrecy.

Azerbaijan's government and military have refused to comment on the
deaths, news of which emerged shortly after authorities in May
announced the spy scandal.

Journalists who initially reported on the deaths have been warned by
the Prosecutor-General's Office to stop. And most relatives of the
dead soldiers are reluctant to speak to journalists, with some
expressing fear about their own safety if they do.

The silence, Baku's poor human rights record, and the way Azerbaijan's
military hastily buried the soldiers without letting relatives see
their bodies, have fed rumors that the suspects were tortured to death
while being interrogated.

Spying For Armenia

The spy scandal came to light on May 7 when a joint statement was
issued by the State Security Service, the Prosecutor-General's Office,
the Interior Ministry, and the Defense Ministry.

It said authorities had "opened a criminal case against a group of
military personnel and civilians in Azerbaijan" on charges of "treason
against the state."

The statement said members of the spy ring had worked for the
intelligence services of archrival Armenia "at various times in the
past" and "for their own interest." It also said they provided "state
secrets" to Armenia, which Azerbaijan has been locked in conflict with
over Nagorno-Karabakh for decades.

Secretive Arrests

Azerbaijan's authorities have not named any individuals accused in the
spy case or specified how many suspects were arrested and charged. But
Ilham Ismayil, a former State Security Service officer, told RFE/RL
that a total of 42 people were arrested in raids during May -- mostly
in the Terter region.

Ismayil told RFE/RL that the spy scandal stemmed from an incident in
late 2016 when a group of Armenian military officers allegedly were
allowed to cross from Nagorno-Karabakh and travel behind Azerbaijan's
front lines with the help of Azerbaijani officers.

He said some Armenian officers were given Azerbaijani military
uniforms to wear and that they traveled to the center of Terter -- a
city that was heavily damaged by Armenian forces during the
Nagorno-Karabakh war in the early 1990s.

State Security Service chief Madat Guliyev said the roundup of
spy-ring suspects was ordered by President Ilham Aliyev after
investigators under Guliyev's command provided evidence to both the
president and the Defense Ministry. Based on that evidence, the
Defense Ministry took action. Neither the State Security Service nor
Azerbaijan's government has publicly disclosed the nature of the
intelligence the suspects allegedly provided to Armenia. And, so far,
there have been no public court hearings for any of the suspects.

Suspicious Deaths

Yadigar Sadiqov, a politician from the opposition party Musavat, has
suggested that the deaths in custody of so many suspects just days
after their arrests is highly suspicious. "We don't believe they died
of natural causes," Sadiqov wrote in a May 20 opinion column for the
Baku-based online newspaper Bastainfo.com.

Sadiqov also suggested many people in Azerbaijan assume the suspects
were tortured to death, noting that "across social media, there are
people saying the government was justified to torture and kill" them.

In each case, the suspects were detained in raids close to the contact
line that separates Armenian-backed and Azerbaijani forces near
Nagorno-Karabakh. Within days, their dead bodies were returned to
their home villages and buried by soldiers who did not allow relatives
to see them.

Opposition media in Azerbaijan that have reported about the deaths and
burials have been officially warned they would be prosecuted for
revealing "state secrets" if they published any more information about
the spy case that wasn't officially released by state institutions.

With the exception of a cousin of one dead soldier who spoke only on
condition of anonymity because he feared retribution from authorities,
relatives of the deceased suspects have refused to talk to RFE/RL or
other media organizations.

Amnesty International confirms that it has received complaints from
sources within Azerbaijan alleging that the soldiers were tortured to
death. But Levan Asatiani, Amnesty International's campaigner on the
South Caucasus, says his organization cannot immediately confirm the
torture claims because Azerbaijan has become a "closed country" that
blocks the work of international human rights researchers.

He said Azerbaijan has a well-documented history of using torture to
induce false confessions from political prisoners who are lawyers,
journalists, and opposition activists. "You could say that the use of
torture is a trend in Azerbaijan," Asatiani said.

Hasty Burials

Namized Safarov, a Baku-based human rights lawyer, told RFE/RL that a
retired military officer named Saleh Qafarov was arrested on treason
charges in early May at his village of Aydinqyshlaq in the Gabala
region.

Safarov said Azerbaijani soldiers returned Qafarov's body four days
later for burial in the village, but Qafarov's relatives never saw his
remains and were not allowed to attend the burial. Since then, Safarov
said, Qafarov's family has faced "heavy harassment" from other
villagers angered by the treason allegations. Qafarov's children have
been expelled from school.

Imran Cabbarov, the head of the local government in Aydinqyshlaq,
confirmed that Qafarov died in custody. "He died and was buried,"
Cabbarov told RFE/RL. "Only law-enforcement bodies can talk about
it. If he committed such a crime as treason, it would serve him
right."

Bastainfo.com and the Berlin-based independent website Meydan TV
reported similar circumstances when the bodies of other suspects in
the spy case were returned to their villages.

Temkin Nizamioglu, a 24-year-old lieutenant from the Ordubad region
near Azerbaijan's southern border with Iran, was one of at least three
active military officers reportedly arrested in the case. Nizamioglu
was buried in his village of Darkend by Azerbaijani soldiers who
returned his body.

"It's true that his body was brought to the village for burial, and
according to the soldiers who brought him, he had heart problems and
died in a hospital," the village's municipal chief, Raqib, said.

The body of officer Elcin Quliyev was delivered for burial in his town
of Terter on May 18 shortly after he was arrested in the spy case. A
cousin of Quliyev, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told Meydan TV
that the soldiers who returned his body didn't give the family any
details about the cause of his death.

"They just said they were investigating the issue and would inform us
about the cause of his death when that investigation is finished," the
cousin said.

Mehman Huseynov, a military officer from the village of Agkend in the
Terter region, also died in custody within days of being arrested in
the spy case. Local residents refused to allow Huseynov to be buried
in the village cemetery because of the treason accusations against
him.

Meydan TV also reported that a 32-year-old soldier named Elcin
Mirzaliyev was buried in his village of Shalig in the Ucar region,
within days of being arrested in the case. That report said Mirzaliyev
died on May 25 and was returned to his village the next day by
soldiers who buried him without allowing relatives to see his body or
attend his burial.

The head of Shalig's municipality, Arif Ahmadov, confirmed that
Mirzaliyev was buried but would not give any details about the cause
of his death.

There have been anonymous claims on social media that other
Azerbaijani soldiers have died in custody after being arrested for
treason in the spy scandal. RFE/RL could not confirm the veracity of
those reports or attest to the reliability of the sources.

(Written by RFE/RL correspondent Ron Synovitz, with reporting from
RFE/RL's Azerbaijani Service.)


Reprinted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
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