Baku court continues sham trial of abducted Artsakh civilian

A court in Baku on Tuesday resumed the sham trial of Vagif Khachatryan, an Artsakh civilian kidnapped by Azerbaijani forces in late July.

The 68-year-old man was abducted and arrested by Azerbaijani border guards at the Lachin Corridor checkpoint on 29 July while being evacuated to Armenia by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) for an urgent heart surgery.

Khachatryan is being tried on trumped-up charges of "genocide" in the village of Meshali on 22 December 1991. He has denied all charges against him and claimed that witness statements had been falsified.

"I apologize to the Azerbaijani people for what happened, but I was not there," he reiterated at today's court hearing.