By Sabina Mammadli
Two Armenians charged with committing terror in Kalbajar, liberated from Armenian occupation in the 2020 second Karabakh war, have been sentenced to nearly 20 years in jail.
The judicial board's decision was revealed during the trial at the administrative building of Baku's Sabunchu district court.
Ishkhan Sargsyan was sentenced to 19 years and Vladimir Rafaelyan to 18 years in jail.
Under the verdict, the accused will serve nine years in jail and the remainder of their sentences in a strict regime colony. They will depart Azerbaijan after serving their sentences.
During the trial, which was presided over by Ganja Grave Crimes Court judge Elmin Rustamov, the defendants' lawyers and later the defendants themselves presented remarks.
Earlier, the prosecutor urged the court to sentence Sargsyan to 20 years in jail and Rafaelyan to 19 years.
The indictment stated that at about 03:00 on May 27, 2021, the commander of the group in the military unit of the Armenian Defence Ministry special intelligence forces Ishkhan Sargsyan and Vladimir Rafaelyan, who served in the military as sapper engineers illegally crossed Azerbaijan's state border in the direction of Kalbajar region, where the Azerbaijani Defence Ministry units are deployed, and mined the roads passing through Yukhari Ayrim village. These persons were arrested at the scene of the crime. Some 23 TM 62-M and E-00-M-type mines were detected and confiscated from them.
It should be noted that in a criminal case initiated by the State Security Service, Sargsyan and Rafaelyan were charged under Azerbaijani Criminal Code Articles 214.2.3 (terrorism committed with the use of firearms and objects used as weapons), 228 (illegal acquisition, transfer, sale, storage, transportation, or carrying weapons, components for them, ammunition, explosives, and explosive devices), 318 (illegal crossing of Azerbaijan's state border), and 282 (sabotage).
Azerbaijan and Armenia resumed their second war on September 27, 2020, when Armenia began firing on Azerbaijani civilians and military positions. The war came to an end on November 10, when the leaders of Azerbaijan, Russia, and Armenia signed a trilateral cease-fire agreement.
The Azerbaijani army declared victory over the Armenian forces. The agreement required Armenia to withdraw its troops from Azerbaijani territory that it had occupied since the early 1990s.
In the war unleashed by Armenia, Azerbaijan's Ganja, Barda, Yevlakh, Beylagan, Tartar, Gabala, Goranboy, Aghjabadi, Khizi and other cities and regions, fairly far from the war zone, came under Armenia's missile and artillery fire.
Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have confirmed that Armenia used prohibited cluster bombs and missiles in its attacks on Azerbaijani cities.
As a result, 100 Azerbaijani civilians, including 12 children and 27 women, were killed. There were 454 people injured, including 35 children. One hundred and eighty-one children lost one parent, five children lost both parents, and one family died. In total, 12,292 residential and non-residential structures, as well as 288 vehicles, were damaged.
