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Masked and armed Azerbaijani servicemen illegally stopped a civilian bus carrying a group of Armenian children on a road in Vorotan in Armenia’s Goris community to evidently intimidate them, Armenia’s Human Rights Defender (Ombudsman) Arman Tatoyan said on Facebook on Friday.

The ombudsman shared a video showing the Azerbaijani servicemen checking the children’s phones under the pretext of finding some video footage.

The teenage boys, aged between 15-16, were travelling to Armenia from Artsakh to play football, Tatoyan said.

“The Azerbaijani soldiers, wearing masks and weapons, checked the children’s phones under the pretext of finding some videos. They kept the children’s bus for 10-15 minutes. During that time, they scraped the Artsakh flag off the bus with a knife,” the ombudsman said.

“Azerbaijani sources are proudly sharing the video. But the issue here is the behavior of the Azerbaijani forces aimed at overtly terrifying the children,” Tatoyan said.

He said the video had gone viral on Azerbaijani social media platforms, accompanied by insulting comments and hateful calls to kill Armenians.

“All this is the result of years of state-sponsored anti-Armenian policy of Azerbaijan. We have documented the evidence,” Tatoyan added.