US Congress Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission hearing focuses on unlawfully held Armenian prisoners in Azerbaijan

The ethnic cleansing perpetrated by Azerbaijan in Nagorno-Karabakh and the unlawfully held Armenian prisoners were in the focus of a hearing at the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission of the US Congress, the ANCA reported.

The hearing was chaired by Congressman Chris Smith.

In his opening remarks, Chairman Smith laid bare the core issue: “We need to work for the release of political prisoners and POWs held by the government of Azerbaijan, to protect Armenian cultural heritage, and to uphold the right to return one day to live in peace and freedom in Nagorno-Karabakh.”  He noted that, “Aliyev took prisoners during the conquest of Artsakh and uses them to manipulate the anger of Azerbaijan’s exploited citizens.”

Chairman Smith then announced his intention to re-introduce the Azerbaijan Democracy Act, legislation that would place direct political and economic consequences on Azerbaijan for its human rights violations and war crimes. “We need to push very hard for this new bill. It must be bipartisan – to show that we’re all on the same page, and that we care deeply, especially for the prisoners of war and the political prisoners,” stated Rep. Smith.  He anticipated, “there will be a lobbying effort by people on K Street to kill it. That happened before. But this time we’re ready. We know exactly what Aliyev is – a despot. And we’ll do everything we can to pass this bill.”

Chairman Smith also called for comprehensive sanctions targeting top Azerbaijani officials under existing U.S. laws.  “We’ve got the Magnitsky sanctions, the Global Magnitsky Act, which we need to be doing the analysis and then meting out those sanctions to the appropriate abusers everywhere, including in Azerbaijan,” he stated. “And I think it starts with the top, frankly, with Aliyev.”

Chairman Smith emphasized the importance of religious freedom accountability, expressing disappointment that the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) had not recommended that Azerbaijan be designated a “Country of Particular Concern” (CPC).  “That should be revisited immediately, and the Secretary of State should act.”

Chairman Smith also pledged to escalate U.S. engagement at the highest levels to secure the release of Armenian prisoners and hold Azerbaijan accountable for its crimes. “We really need to ratchet this up big time. And for Ruben [Vardanyan], we need to, and all the others, do everything we can to effectuate the release, to get all of this downtown to the White House, and to [Secretary] Marco Rubio,” he said. “We’re going to do everything we can to get all of this to him because again, he’s got a lot on his plate, but he cares deeply about human rights,” concluded Smith.

The former Nagorno-Karabakh State Minister and Human Rights Ombudsman Artak Beglaryan also participated in the hearing.

He delivered a devastating eyewitness account of Azerbaijan’s ethnic cleansing campaign. “Within three years, Azerbaijan successfully perpetrated a full genocide against my people… through blockade, military assaults, the unlawful abduction of our leaders, destruction of cultural heritage, and relentless anti-Armenian hatred. In September 2023, I and 120,000 others were forcibly displaced – every Armenian ethnically cleansed from Artsakh.”

Beglaryan detailed how Azerbaijan’s genocidal actions are rooted in a systemic policy of hatred. “There is an anti-Armenian hatred policy and system in Azerbaijan. Actually, this is the number one foundation for both anti-Armenian mass atrocities, but also for the internal domestic human rights violations and repressions,” Beglaryan explained. “It is the number one pillar of Aliyev’s dictatorial regime. He keeps power based on this anti-Armenian hatred and distracts the Azerbaijani people to the external enemy – Armenians.”

Beglaryan further warned, that “now Aliyev is threatening the sovereign territory of Armenia itself.”

Jared Genser, Managing Director of Perseus Strategies, LLC, who is the attorney for Ruben Vardanyan, the former State Minister of NK currently jailed in Azerbaijan, said, ““Ruben’s ongoing imprisonment remains a powerful symbol of Aliyev’s brutality. He faces life in prison on more than 40 fabricated charges. His trial is a mockery of justice: closed proceedings, no access to legal counsel, and even denial of the Bible. He was tortured during a hunger strike. And he’s not alone – at least 23 Armenians are being held in sham trials, and hundreds more have been forcibly disappeared.”