Statement by Human Rights Lawyer Siranush Sahakyan on the Indictment Against Ruben Vardanyan
Yerevan, May 23, 2025 – I, Siranush Sahakyan, human rights lawyer and representative of Ruben Vardanyan’s family, and a member of his international legal team, declare that upon reviewing a portion of the indictment in Ruben Vardanyan’s case (spanning more than 200 pages), it is evident that the charges against him are politically motivated, legally groundless, and constitute a gross violation of international law and the principles of a fair trial.
Several critical points stand out in the document:
First, in direct contradiction to fundamental legal principles, the indictment effectively treats Ruben Vardanyan’s Armenian identity as a basis for criminal liability. The framing of the charges suggests that ethnic origin alone serves as primary evidence of guilt. This undermines the very foundation of modern justice systems – the principle of nullum crimen sine lege (“no crime without law”) and the requirement of individual criminal responsibility.
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Second, the indictment designates the Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh (NKR), home to approximately 150,000 Armenians, as a criminal organization. This contradicts one of the core principles of international law – the right of peoples to self-determination. In the indictment, this right is mischaracterized as incitement to hatred. The document thus retroactively criminalizes a political entity that had been engaged for decades in negotiations with the OSCE Minsk Group. Moreover, Ruben Vardanyan is being held accountable for events that occurred up to 30 years before his arrival in the unrecognized republic.
Third, the indictment accuses Ruben Vardanyan of illegally crossing the Azerbaijani state border, which served as the pretext for his arrest on September 27, 2023. However, at the time, the Lachin Corridor was under the control of Russian peacekeepers. Furthermore, Azerbaijan had committed to guaranteeing freedom of movement through the corridor under the terms of the November 9, 2020, trilateral agreement. The UN International Court of Justice also upheld this right: on February 22 and July 6, 2023, it issued binding orders affirming the necessity of ensuring unimpeded movement of people, vehicles, and goods along the Lachin Corridor in both directions. Similar rulings were issued by the European Court of Human Rights.
Thus, there were no legal grounds for Ruben Vardanyan’s detention. The NKR has consistently been treated by the international community as a disputed territory, yet the indictment treats the very subject of this international dispute – the legal status of the territory and applicable border regime – as an established fact. In doing so, the prosecution commits the logical fallacy of petitio principii (“begging the question”), using as proof an assertion that itself requires legal determination.
Finally, the indictment portrays the Aurora Humanitarian Initiative – co-founded by Ruben Vardanyan and his partners to assist vulnerable populations worldwide – as an organization allegedly financing terrorism. This accusation is patently absurd given that Aurora is internationally recognized as a respected humanitarian initiative that provides aid to victims of crises around the globe. According to this logic, humanitarian assistance to refugees and conflict-affected populations is being equated with criminal activity.
In sum, the indictment is not merely politically motivated; it constitutes a profound distortion of core legal principles and sets a dangerous precedent.
This is not an isolated case. Seven Armenians currently detained in Baku have already been sentenced to lengthy prison terms on politically motivated and legally unsubstantiated charges – a clear affront to internationally recognized standards of justice and due process. The remaining sixteen now stand on the brink of facing similarly unfair and politically driven prosecutions.
You can read the excerpt from the indictment – which clearly illustrates the absurdity, political motivation, and legal invalidity of the charges – at the following link:
