Mirror Spectator/(Azatutyun) — Armenia has asked a third country to have its diplomats visit Armenian prisoners held in Azerbaijan, the Foreign Ministry in Yerevan said on August 21.
The ministry revealed the request in comments to the Sputnik news agency. It did not name that “neutral” country or say whether Armenia has also asked Azerbaijan to allow such visits. It said only that Baku’s permission is necessary.
“It’s not clear whether the third country has given its consent and whether an official application regarding the candidacy of that third country has been submitted to the Azerbaijani authorities,” said Siranush Sahakyan, a Yerevan-based lawyer representing the prisoners in the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR).
Sahakyan told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service that the Armenian government should answer these questions. She said that organizing third-party visits is “extremely important” now because the 19 captives, among them eight former leaders of Nagorno-Karabakh, have been essentially held incommunicado for more than a year.
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Up until last year, the Azerbaijani authorities allowed representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) to periodically visit them to inspect their detention conditions, inquire about their health and arrange phone calls between them and their families. The Red Cross lost that exclusive access after being forced to close its mission in Azerbaijan in September 2025. The ECHR later ordered Baku to submit such information to the Strasbourg court.
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