Human rights activist: Injighulian’s parents may apply to ECHR

Since it is not known whether Armenian soldier Hakob Injighulian held captive in Azerbaijan made any demands or not, his parents may apply to the European Court of Human Rights, based on Article 8 (right to respect for private and family life) of the European Convention on Human Rights, the human rights activist, international law expert Ara Ghazarian told Pastinfo news agency, explaining that the article includes the right of the parent to reunite with the child and that in such cases the states to have joined the Convention have a positive obligation to ensure at least one direct contact of the parent and the child prior to sending the person to a third country.

Ghazarian stressed that there are no such precedents, but there have been precedents by analogy so, instead of relying only on the ICRC and the competent state bodies, an attempt should be made to use the mechanism of private law as well. Ara Ghazarian advises Hakob Injighulian’s parents to apply to the ICHR.

“Perhaps this will set a precedent because new such incidents will happen. I don’t doubt that because the Azerbaijani government does not change its policy on the Armenians – I want to stress – on the Armenians, and not the Republic of Armenia. Xenophobia is on the rise in Azerbaijan,” Ghazarian said.