Safarov extradition: how Azerbaijan deceived Hungary

PanARMENIAN.Net - Hungary’s Ministry of Public Administration and Justice has commented on the extradition of Armenian officer’s murderer Ramil Safarov to Azerbaijan.

According to the ministry, Baku assured Budapest that “informed the Ministry of Public Administration and Justice of Hungary that Ramil Safarov’s sentence will not be converted but will immediately be continued to be enforced, according to the Hungarian judgment.”

When the deceit surfaced it was already too late.

In response to PanARMENIAN.Net rsquo;s inquiry, the ministry cited the 1983 Strasbourg Convention on the Transfer of Sentenced Persons, which says that “a person sentenced in the territory of a Party may be transferred to the territory of another Party, in accordance with the provisions of the Convention, in order to serve the sentence imposed on him.”

According to the information provided by the Ministry of Justice of Azerbaijan, under the Criminal Code of Azerbaijan the act for which the sentence was imposed constitutes a criminal offence that may be punished by life imprisonment.

Persons sentenced to life imprisonment may, at the earliest, be conditionally released after serving a period of twenty-five years.

However, Safarov was granted a presidential pardon almost immediately after his arrival in Azerbaijan.