By Mark Trevelyan
(Reuters) – A former senior official in the breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region complained on the eve of his trial before an Azerbaijani military court on Friday that he did not have enough time to prepare his defense on 42 charges including terrorism.
Ruben Vardanyan, who was a billionaire banker born in Armenia before he made his fortune in Russia, asked that the case be stopped.
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“Once again … expressing my complete innocence and the innocence of my fellow Armenians also held as political prisoners and demanding an immediate end to this political case against us,” said e in a statement released through his family.
Vardanyan was Karabakh's number two official from late 2022 to February 2023. Seven months later, Azerbaijan recaptured the stronghold where ethnic Armenians had enjoyed three decades of de facto independence since breaking away. from the control of Baku in war after the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Vardanyan was arrested when he fled as part of a mass exodus of about 100,000 Armenians from the mountainous region.
According to Azerbaijani prosecutors, fifteen other people, including several former Karabakh leaders, are also facing trial on various charges including genocide and war crimes.
The charges against Vardanyan, all of which he denies, include torture, running guns, extorting people by force, seizing power by force, and plotting and waging an aggressive war.
“During the investigation, Ruben Vardanyan's rights to legal protection, the use of his preferred language, and other procedural rights were ensured,” prosecutors said in a statement, adding that he had full access to materials of the case.
In a statement sent by his family on Telegram, Vardanyan disputed it.
“I have been told that I am facing 42 charges, some of which carry sentences up to life imprisonment. However, I have not been given the opportunity to fully review the official charge,” he said.
He said that the 422 volumes of the criminal case against him were handed to him and his lawyer on December 9 in Azerbaijani, a language he does not speak.
Vardanyan said he was detained for more than 470 days, including 340 in solitary confinement and 23 in a punishment cell. But he said that he did not harbor anger or hatred, and that he wanted “real peace” between Armenians and Azerbaijanis.
(Additional reporting by Nailia Bagirova and Lucy Papachristou, Editing by Timothy Heritage)
