Statement of the Council of NGOs of NKR on decision of Hungarian authorities to extradite Ramil Safarov

In connection with the decision of the Hungarian authorities to extradite Ramil Safarov, sentenced to life imprisonment for murdering the Armenian officer Gurgen Margaryan, the Council of Nongovernmental Organizations (NGOs) of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic (NKR) hereby states the following:

We consider this step of the Government of Hungary as a destruction of common human values and a violation of provisions of the international norms and laws of the own country. We treat the decision to extradite Safarov, who embodies the Baku's policy of hatred towards Armenia, as support by the Hungarian authorities of the aggression and violence, which form the basis of the official position of Azerbaijan. This decision is another proof of the declarative nature of European values - when human rights are brought to sacrifice for the sake of momentary economic benefits. We hope that the civil society of Hungary will correspondingly assess what has happened. We demand that the European Union has expressed its official attitude to the blatant fact of neglecting the standards of humanity and law by a member state of the European Union.

Otherwise, the Council of NGOs of the NKR will be forced to consider the issue of distrust to the European Union. In the coming days we'll convene an extraordinary Forum of NGOs of the NKR to discuss the issue of suspending any cooperation of the civil society of the NKR with the international structures and organizations operating on behalf of and under the auspice of the European Union.

September 1, 2012