REPORT

This report presents the results of human rights monitoring conducted by the participants of South Caucasus Human Rights School. (Rus.)

18.09.2006 17:06 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/
“I am sure that cooperation of the parties on the matters of the missing can be useful for everyone,” PACE Rapporteur on the Missing Leo Platvoet told journalists in Stepanakert September 18.

After the approval of my report in Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, State commissions on POWs, Hostages and Missing Persons can have closer cooperation”-Leo Platvoet, PACE reporter for captured and missing persons in South Caucasus informed APA during the exclusive interview.

August 30 was celebrated for the first time in South Caucasus (Baku, Yerevan, Tbilisi, Ganja, Vanadzor and Stepanakert) in 2004 by the offices of Helsinki Citizens’ Assembly South Caucasus. Since 2003 HCA Vanadzor, Helsinki Initiative ’92 of Nagorno Karabakh, HCA Ganja and HCA Georgian and Azerbaijani National Committees have implemented the project “Yellow Tulips” with support of Interchurch Peace Council (IKV, the Netherlands). The project is directed to the solution of the problems of missing persons of regional conflicts.

”In case Leo Platvoet’s report on missing & captured is balanced, there will be no truth in it”,reportedly said MP Aydi Mirzazadeh, member of Azerbaijani delegation to PACE.

Leo Platvoet, PACE reporter for captured and missing persons in South Caucasian countries, is planning a visit to the region in September, Mr Platvoet told Trend in an exclusive interview.

“The Azerbaijani authorities have been exaggerating the subject of Azerbaijani prisoners of war in Karabakh captivity to conceal the true number of its Army losses in the war imposed upon Nagorno Karabakh.

"Nagorno Karabakh does not have hostages, POWs in its territory”-was officially announced by Viktor Kocharyan-head of the state commission on missing persons of Nagorno Karabakh. He gave a positive answer to the question whether hostages had been kept in Karabakh before.

On June 16 the RA NA Speaker Tigran Torosyan received the delegation of the International Red Cross Committee headed by Yves Arnold.
During the meeting issues connected with the searches of the lost persons and the support of their families were discussed.

June 18-20 the International Working Group /IWG/ for Search of Missing, Captives and Release of POWs is arriving in the Nagorno Karabakh.

The PACE Report on the Missing in the South Caucasus Countries is expected to be discussed
at the Assembly's Winter Session, reporter PACE Rapporteur, Dutch MP Leo Platvoet stated in Baku, when summing
up his visit to Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan June 4-9. Speaking of the situation with those missing owing to the
Nagorno Karabakh conflict, Platvoet spoke in favor of forming a special structure with participation of representatives
of respective state bodies of Azerbaijan and Armenia.

Leo Platvoet, the PACE rapporteur on missing, who is in Azerbaijan at present, held a number of
meetings in Milli Mejlis. Mr Platvoet has advanced several proposals that were not accepted by the Azeri
parliamentarians. In order to carry out a detailed investigation Platvoet offered to cooperate with the NGOs of Nagorno
Karabakh.

On June 5, the employees of HCA Vanadzor met with Leo Platvoet - reporter of the PACE Committee on Migration, Refugees and Population, dealing with issues on missing persons of Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan and Mark Neville-Secretary of Committee on Migration, Refugees and Population of the Parliamentary Assembly.