Azerbaijan demands from Armenia to abandon all interstate complaints. Siranush Sahakyan. Hetq.am:

The Republic of Armenia has the opportunity to file a complaint on the basis of the hostage convention at the UN International Court of Justice, because both the former prisoners of war and the current high-ranking leaders mostly have the status of abductees, hostages, and their hostages are related to the demands of meeting the issues of the political agenda. Siranush Sahakyan, a human rights activist and president of the Center for International and Comparative Law, mentioned this in a conversation with "Hetk", expressing the opinion that it would be a very effective measure, but RA does not present a new interstate complaint.

"I think that the Armenian authorities are subject to Azerbaijani pressure in this matter. We also receive various information that Armenia's active involvement in legal processes is very negatively evaluated in the negotiations, and it seems that Armenia's withdrawal from interstate affairs is being considered as a precondition for the peace agenda. They will especially target the discrimination process at the UN court. Of course, the processes of the European Court are also at risk. I would just like to note that our positions in the European Court are more secure, because the legal processes in the ECtHR are diversified, and along with interstate complaints, there are individual cases, and hundreds of complaints have been filed by the victims' successors. And of course, refusing an interstate complaint here will harm vital interests, but we can fill that gap through individual complaints, and the UN court, unfortunately, does not provide an opportunity for individual actions, and the only applying party can be the state. There can be very dangerous processes here, if the Armenian authorities are under pressure and decide that they can refuse legal processes related to such serious questions," said the human rights defender.

Turning to the question of, for example, what dangerous processes can take place, Siranush Sahakyan said: "We are in a very bad situation from a political point of view, and anti-state approaches are being implemented. The only possibility to restore this balance is the legal instances. From the point of view of the Artsakh problem, the position of the UN court regarding the racist policy of Azerbaijan towards the Armenians can be of decisive importance, and it can firstly delegitimize the already reached political agreements and, on the other hand, reaffirm the rights of the Armenians, including to their historical lands, which in the long term, it will create the conditions to fight for the realization of this right. In other words, we will have the legal foundations, and if we bring the country to a level that will have military and economic power, at least for the next generations, this may one day be a solvable problem. But if these legal processes are suspended and anti-Armenian positions are taken on political platforms, we will artificially close the historical page of Artsakh," he said.

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