Dear supporter,
We started the current Petition to raise awareness about Armenian female hostage Maral Najarian in January 2021, and to be honest, we did not expect that we will be campaigning for so long, well perhaps for six months or so.
Two years after Maral's release, we are determined to continue this campaign working with other families of Armenian captives, until ALL Armenian hostages safely return home!!!
British-Armenian humanitarian group is an independent, non-funded group of volunteers, with no political affiliation and without funding from any business, religious group, think tank or political party. We have been campaigning for the release of all Armenian hostages since November 2020 via peaceful protests, Open Letters, Press releases, and e-mails to British politicians, world leaders and human rights organisations, meetings with decision makers.
To continue our campaign for the rights of Armenian captives, public support and donations are vital. By helping us, you are helping us to help the families of Armenian hostages back home. We have created an official fundraiser and highly encourage you to donate on our fundraiser: https://gofund.me/2da11309
With the help of this Petition, we aim to reach 50.000 supporters, so please kindly share the petition link once awhile with your friends and groups on social media:
chng.it/RDJGymybNN
THANK YOU!
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UPDATE ON 10 MARCH 2023
Exactly two years ago on 10 March 2021, Armenian-Lebanese civilian hostage MARAL NAJARIAN was released from the notorious Gobustan prison in Azerbaijan after spending four months in illegal captivity. We worked closely with the family of Maral Najarian, who was released from her solitary confinement in one of the most notorious prisons of Azerbaijan. It took three months to ICRC to get access to Armenian POWs and hostages on 10 February 2021, after which their conditions improved massively. For Maral and everyone else, there was a glimpse of hope that their release was close. One month after the Red Cross visit, Maral Najarian was woken up by prison guards, ordered to dress and was told she was free. She was escorted by two agents to the Baku airport with a handbag and no money inside, put on a flight to Istanbul, and then on a flight to Beirut, where her children and family were waiting for her. And the rest, as they say, is history…
Maral Najarian and Vicken Euljekjian were captured on 10 November 2020 travelling in their car from Goris to Shushi to fetch Vicken’s suitcases left in his Shushi hotel on 27 September when the war broke. Soonafter, they were transferred to a Baku prison with other Armenian hostages. While Maral was released after four months, Vicken was sentenced to 20 years imprisonment following Baku sham trials without adequate legal assistance.
Currently Vicken Euljekjian, age 42, is spending his sentence in solitary confinement in one of the world’s most infamous prisons… His physical and mental health are causing much concern to his elderly mother, children and the whole family.
Azerbaijan continues to hold unlawfully Armenian civilian hostages and POWs captured during the 44-day war, in gross violation of The Third Geneva Convention on the Treatment of POWs. More hostages were taken in 2021 and 2022 after the military aggressions on the sovereign territory of the Republic of Armenia. Azerbaijan claims there are only 33 Armenian captives, but human rights lawyers working with families of captives reckon the number is close to 118, unless all other Armenian hostages have been murdered in captivity...
In summer 2021, 68 of those hostages were sentenced unlawfully to long imprisonments under false accusations and without access to fair legal representation (the full list available).
In May 2021, further two Armenian POWs - Ishkhan Sargsyan and Vladimir Rafaelyan - were captured by Azerbaijani forces near Sev lake following the Azerbaijani aggression on the Republic of Armenia. One year ago, in March 2022, these two young servicemen, Ishkhan and Vladimir, were sentenced to 19 and 18 years imprisonment by the Baku courts.
Meanwhile, in the course of 2021 and 2022 half of those Armenian hostages sentenced during Baku sham trials, were returned to Armenia following high-level interventions from USA, France and the EU. We would like to share with you here three important points:
A) the verdicts of the Baku courts are not even observed by the Azerbaijani authorities themselves, therefore, are not worth the paper they are written on;
B) the release of other Armenian hostages and POWs is achievable;
C) it seems that the only path for the release of remaining Armenian hostages is via diplomatic negotiations, political and economic pressure on the Azerbaijani government.
While the International Court of Justice (ICJ) announced a fair decision on the re-opening of the Lachin corridor, very few have paid attention on other points of the Court’s Order published on 22 February 2023. The Court did not instruct the release of Armenian hostages and Prisoners of War held illegally after the Ceasefire of November 2020, instead, it announced:
“ (a) Protect from violence and bodily harm all persons captured in relation to the 2020 Conflict who remain in detention, and ensure their security and equality before the law” p.2, 3 a)
The ICJ Order did not also deal with the murder cases of several Armenian hostages, tortured to death after being captured and disarmed. Hence, we assume that unfortunately, these grave cases were not raised by the Armenian side. Among the tortured were five Armenian females, who were brutally abused, raped, and beheaded by Azerbaijani soldiers on camera last September during the military invasion of the sovereign territory of Armenia. We have covered those barbaric killings in our previous updates.
Our campaign continues, until ALL hostages and POWs return safely to their families, so please support us by spreading the Petition and following us on social media!
Email: info@britisharmenian.org
Facebook: facebook.com/BritishArmenian
Instagram:instagram.com/british_armenian