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Exclusive interview of Panorama.am with the Ombudsman of NKR Yuri Hayrapetyan.

- Mr. Hayrapetyan, please tell us about your participation at a conference in Austria, devoted to the 25th anniversary of the European Ombudsman Institute.

- In 19-22, September as a member of the European Ombudsman Institute, I attended the event dedicated to the 25th anniversary of the Institute and the regular general meeting of the EOI. One of the main events was the conference of the ombudsmen titled "Independence of the Ombudsman in Europe", which took place on September 20. Deputy European Commissioner for Human Rights Lowry Sivonen, the representative of the European Ombudsman Gerhard Grill, scientists from Italy and Japan, representative of the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights Jörg Gebhard and others read reports at the conference.

I also made a report at the conference. I raised the issue of necessity of paying the official European bodies’ precise attention, involved in the protection of human rights, at the national institute of the ombudsman of the de facto independent states. Informing about the history and formation of the Human Rights Defender Institute of the NKR, I noted that we regard it as an important part of democratic processes taking place in our country.

I emphasized that our institution is deprived of the assistance which was provided by the European structures to the official national ombudsman institutions of post-Soviet states, and thus is forced to evolve, using the international experience that can be found in the Internet and other resources. In this regard, the general meeting of members and other events organized by EOI are, perhaps, the only means to communicate with my colleagues and learn from their experience. I also noted that I am informed about the EU Commissioner for Human Rights N. Muzhnieks’ monitoring conducted in the area of situation of the human rights in various countries, and that I regretted for his absence at the conference and asked his Deputy - Lauri Sivonen to pass him my request on discussing the possibility of his visit to NKR for the same purpose.

- Azerbaijani media spread disinformation about you allegedly being "removed from the conference" at the request of the Azerbaijani side. Please, tell us what happened there in reality?

- After my speech the representative of Azerbaijani ombudsman Z. Aliyev asked a word. He made a traditional anti-Armenian statement stating that my participation in the conference is a violation of international law. In response to this statement the rather rigid comment of the Secretary General EOI Zh. Zigele followed. He rightly drew attention of the speaker to the inadmissibility of political statements made by him from the conference tribune as well as the legitimacy of my participation. Mr. L. Sivonen, thanked me for my offer and noted that it was right, the administration of EU Commissioner was not engaged in providing technical assistance to the Institute of Ombudsman of the de facto independent states, and kindly agreed to convey to Mr. N. Muzhnieks my invitation to visit Nagorno Karabakh in order to monitor the human rights situation there. The next day, on 21 September, a general meeting of members of the EOI was held. The reports of the President and other senior officials of EOI were presented. It was followed by the election of the president, members of the board and auditors of the organization in which I also participated as a full member of the EOI.

A detailed report about my stay in Innsbruck can be found on the website of the Ombudsman of the NKR (ombudsnkr.am) and the Facebook page (Ombudsman Office of the NKR). As for the information posted on the website of the Ombudsman of Azerbaijan ombudsman.gov.az stating that at the request of Z. Aliyev, the employee of the Azerbaijani Ombudsman Office, I was allegedly "removed" from the international conference, it is a blatant lie. Perhaps, this disinformation has been prepared for internal use only and was not intended to deliver it out of the Azerbaijani borders, in order not to be caught in lie. However, the Ombudsman is available at just the Azerbaijani language (without translation into English). However, some Azerbaijani agencies caught this "canard" and quickly spread it in Russian.

In addition, he also made a mistake, the European Institute of the Ombudsman marked not the 15th (as stated in its information), but the 25th anniversary of its establishment. The representative of Azerbaijan misinforms also the government, saying that "in his speech, he has presented in detail the activities of the Ombudsman Office of Azerbaijan." In fact, he addressed to Mr. L. Sivonen with a strange question concerning the possibility of the European Commissioner for Human Rights to influence on Strasburg court. This caused bewilderment among the present. In response an Ombudsman from one of the regions taught a little lesson to Z. Aliyev on the judicial independence topic, and Mr. L. Sivonen developed this topic bringing the example of the European Court of Human Rights.

- What are you planning to do next?

I turned to the community of the ombudsmen to Europe with a call to condemn the behavior of the representative of Azerbaijan. In the current situation, I, as a member of the European community of ombudsmen, am more concerned with the future of the Institute of ombudsman in general, which by such behavior of some members endangers itself of becoming a political body, and thus to step away from the famous Parisian principles. Regarding the political, not just incorrect, but also false, and sometimes bellicose statements of the Azerbaijani Ombudsman, this institution has already undergone such transformation in the neighboring state. Therefore, I considered it my duty to bring this to the attention of all EOI members. I would like to hope that it will help them be more critical towards the Azerbaijani Ombudsman’s anti-Armenian statements which have already become traditional.