12:21,

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 13, ARMENPRESS. A Baku court has held a preliminary hearing in the show trial of Vagif Khachatryan, an elderly Nagorno-Karabakh man who was kidnapped by Azeri border guards during his ICRC-mediated medical evacuation on July 29. 

In Baku, the Azeri authorities pressed fabricated charges against Khachatryan. Khachatryan has since been jailed in Azerbaijan. 

The hearing in the show trial will continue on October 17.

The Armenian foreign ministry earlier said that the arrest of the Red Cross-protected patient from Nagorno-Karabakh amounts to war crime.

Prominent lawyer Siranush Sahakyan earlier said that the kidnapping constitutes extraordinary rendition in terms of international law and a due process is therefore ruled out.

The kidnapped man’s daughter, in a plea to the UN to ensure the safe release of her father, said that all charges pressed by the Azeri prosecution are fabricated and her father is innocent.