According to the 29 December announcement by the Ministry of Defense of Armenia, on the same day, early in the morning, the Azerbaijani armed forces initiated an armed attack in the vicinity of Chinari village in Tavush province of the Republic of Armenia, resulting in the death of three military servicemen.
Immediately after publication of the news, regional representative of the Human Rights Defender went to Chinary village to carry out examination of human rights violations, including violations of the right to life and to carry out necessary fact-finding activities.
Throughout today and yesterday, the representative of the Defender carried out fact-finding activities in Chinari in compliance with internationally recognized special principles. Private conversations were held with the head of the village of Chinari, members of the Council of the Elders, villagers, as well as with servicemen of the Armenian armed forces. Afterwards, a member accompanied in examining the locality, publicly accessible information about the attack and other necessary information.
Afterwards, with the accompanying member of the Council of the Elders, necessary examinations, including examination of the locality, publicly accessible information about the attack were conducted.
As a result, the following facts were recorded: on December 29, the Azerbaijani armed forces killed three Armenian military servicemen in a situation when there was no probability or threat of an attack. Besides, the manner of the attack clearly indicated the intention of the Azerbaijani armed forces to injure the peaceful civilian population. Starting from the early morning, since the initiation of the shelling, peaceful villagers had to hide in special shelters. They left the shelters at around 13:00 in the afternoon. The fact-finding activities revealed traces of bombardments posing an obvious threat to the lives of the village’s peaceful population, including children, women and older people. Those traces prove that there had been targeted shootings towards the houses of peaceful residents. These encroachments by the Azerbaijani armed forces manifestly violate all the international requirements regarding human rights.
The Human Rights Defender’s Office has already started summarizing the results of the above activities with a special method. As a priority, a summary document on the conducted fact-finding activities is being prepared to be presented to competent international organizations in English.