Hungary must apologize to Armenians for Safarov's extradition to Azerbaijan, MP tells PACE

Addressing the PACE plenary session on Tuesday, Armenian MP Hayk Mamijanyan, head of the opposition Pativ Unem faction, insisted that Hungary owes an apology to the Armenian people after the extradition of an Azerbaijani officer convicted of murdering an Armenian serviceman. His full remarks are provided below.

"Honourable Chair, dear colleagues,

I want to speak about some more facts that show the pattern of behaviour of the Hungarian authorities.

You all know that Armenian Army lieutenant Gurgen MARGARYAN was murdered with an axe while asleep by an Azerbaijani participant during a NATO event in Hungary back in 2004.

In 2012, he was extradited to Azerbaijan, where he was pardoned, promoted and given an apartment. The reaction of the Secretary General of this Council of Europe was, and I quote: "Honouring a convicted murderer and transforming him into a hero is unacceptable.”

Five years later, an investigation into the Azerbaijani laundromat money-laundering scheme uncovered and revealed that several bank transfers in 2012, totalling more than USD $9 million, were made to the Hungarian MKB Bank account in Budapest right around the time when the Hungarian government extradited Ramil SAFAROV to Azerbaijan. Still to this very day, there has been no official apology from the Hungarian authorities. They owe an apology to the Armenian people.

I began with the expression "pattern of behaviour" on purpose. This year, when EU member states decided to allocate "non-lethal" military aid to Armenia from the European Peace Facility, Hungary vetoed the decision in the European Council. I would like to add that there are publications in the media that a few months before the Azerbaijani offensive, Budapest had already signed contracts to help the Azerbaijani authorities rebuild villages in Nagorno-Karabakh.

Thank you."