Caucasian Knot | Relatives of missing soldiers block a street in Yerevan

Today, members of the families of soldiers, missing in action during the autumn war in Nagorno-Karabakh, have blocked Geratsi Street in Yerevan. The protestors claim discrepancies in the official information concerning the number of the dead bodies found. The relatives of the missing soldiers were met by officers from the scientific and practical centre of forensic medicine, and after the meeting, the traffic along the street was restored.

The “Caucasian Knot” has reported that on May 25, Karabakh rescuers reported that the bodies and remains of 1557 people were found in the area of the combat actions. On May 11, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliev announced that Baku had returned to Armenia all the prisoners of war (POWs) who were captured as a result of the autumn aggravation of the Karabakh conflict, as well as about 1600 bodies of the dead Armenian soldiers.

Relatives of the missing soldiers blocked Geratsi Street. According to the protestors, their action was triggered by the fact that the authorities were hiding the bodies of the victims, the “Yerevan Today” reported.

While the authorities have publicly announced the official number of the dead bodies, in fact, there are many times more bodies in the morgues, says Arsen Gukasyan, one of the protesters, as quoted by the “News.Am”. The relatives of the soldiers missing in action demanded to provide them with the complete information.

The scientific and practical centre of forensic medicine does not hide any information from the parents of the soldiers killed during the combat actions in Karabakh, the press service for the Ministry for Public Health of Armenia reports. If they had such a desire, the relatives of the missing soldiers had the opportunity to visit any morgue and get all the information, the Armenian Ministry for Public Health emphasizes. However, the relatives of the missing soldiers decided to block the road, the “News.Am” reports.