Azerbaijani soldier arrested in Armenia charged with killing Armenian man

YEREVAN, April 19. /ARKA/. The charges brought against Azerbaijani Huseyn Akhundov, one of the two Azerbaijani soldiers, detained in Armenia last week, were revised by a prosecutor’s decision, and he was charged with killing an Armenian man, the press service of the Prosecutor General's Office reported.

Initially, the Azerbaijani soldiers, who had crossed into Armenia earlier this month had been arrested and charged with illegal crossing of Armenian border, illegal transportation of weapons across Armenian border, as well as with illegal storage and transportation of weapons and ammunition.

According to Armenian National Security Service, Akhundov was caught on April 13 not far from the security post of Zangezur copper and molybdenum combine in Syunik region of Armenia after killing the combine’s security guard the previous day.

Akhundov stole the killed man’s cell phone and tried to steal the latter’s car in order to flee to neighboring Iran, but failed to get it started.

Before leaving the place, Akhundov downloaded an Internet application on the stolen cell phone and placed the recorded video message on his social networking page, in which he bragged about killing Armenians and said “we are not traitors of our fatherland.”

The video was widely circulated by Armenian media outlets shortly after Akhundov was apprehended by several Syunik residents on a highway near the provincial capital Kapan and handed over to the law-enforcement authorities.

The second Azerbaijani serviceman, identified as Akshin Bebirov, was detained on April 12 in another Syunik village.

According to the Armenian military, Bebirov said he had crossed the Armenian border with Azerbaijan’s Nakhichevan exclave together with another soldier believed to be Akhundov. -0-