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  • After 22 Months of Captivity in Azerbaijan, Artur Badalyan Recalls N

    HETQ, Armenia
    Dec 30 2011


    After 22 Months of Captivity in Azerbaijan, Artur Badalyan Recalls the
    Nightmares


    23:40, December 29, 2011
    Anush Bulghadaryan

    For 22 months he had the tough planks as his bed and prayers as his
    unquenchable hope. Somewhere far behind the mist was his 5-month son,
    somewhere nearby - the mice, the non-stop voice of the metal and
    humiliations.

    Haghartsin village inhabitant Artur Badalyan, 32, carries in his mind
    the nightmares of almost two years of the Azerbaijani captivity that
    are engraved in his mind, dividing his life into before and after the
    captivity.

    Though he was back home on March 17, as a result of exchange of
    captives, the nightmares, insomnia, the noises in his head and the
    permanent feeling of pursuit do not leave him.

    On May 9, 2009, Artur and his friends went to pick up mushrooms. In
    the area of Berd town he lost his friends and his way and fell into
    the enemy's hands.

    `Somebody asked for cigarettes in Armenian, I gave him. He said
    nothing more. Only in Russian - don't be afraid. Then several
    approached and took me away,' he recalls. `I was thinking the worst. I
    thought I wouldn't ever be back, they were going to slaughter me for
    their bayram'.

    At first, the Azerbaijanis took Artur to a border village military
    unit, then to Ghazakh, then to Baku and then back to Ghazakh again.

    The only good memory of Artur's captivity in Baku's lightless and damp
    prison ward is the mouse with her young mice. They were born and grew
    up before his eyes. He says they were his only friends in the days of
    his nightmares.

    He tells that the very second day of the captivity, in the military
    unit of the unknown village, two men made him lie on the belly and
    hurt his legs by beating him intensively. Afterwards, he was taken to
    Azerbaijan's Ghazakh town military unit, where they were switching
    electric current through his arms.

    `In Ghazakh I was kept lying one day with my hands tied. They wouldn't
    untie my arms, so that I could at least massage my legs. The next day,
    too, they beat me and switched electricity to my arms. I felt the
    current through whole my body,' tells Artur with difficulty but in
    details.

    He tells that apart from the physical torture they would torment him
    psychologically as well, aiming to make him commit suicide.

    After Ghazakh, Artur stayed at one of Baku military units for a year
    and 3 months.

    `In Baku it was terrible. I was treated like a swine and not a human.
    The ward had no window, there was no light. They would strike the door
    with a metal item every day. I didn't have a minute of rest.'

    During those 2 years, the captive wasn't allowed to walk, and very
    often Artur had to do the deeds in the same ward, where he lived. He
    was permitted to take care of his personal hygiene only once in 2-3
    months in the yard. He recalls the freezing water jet on his body in
    cold weather.

    Many days he passed in hunger.

    `It was a terrible situation. I washed my clothes only when they were
    `cleaning' the ward with chlorine. Then I had to close my eyes with a
    piece of cloth, not to go blind. Whole night, naked, I was shaking my
    clothes or lying on them to dry with the heat of my body. There was no
    food. I was eating bad bread,' tell the villager.

    He says he was frequently catching cold and hardly being cured without
    any medicine and care. It would be naïve even to dream of them.

    In November 2010, Artur Badalyan was again moved to the same unit of
    Ghazakh town. He says there he was given some medicaments in the food,
    since he was feeling very bad, weak and almost insensible.

    `They put a belt there for me to hang myself and there was a special
    place for hanging, too' says the survivor of Azerbaijani capture.

    When he was in Ghazakh for the second time, he learnt some
    representatives of the Red Cross would visit him - before that nobody
    had ever paid him a visit.

    `I told the Red Cross I went to Ghazakh to ask the Azerbaijani side to
    send me to a third country. They had warned me if I failed to say so,
    they would send me back to Baku. So, I had to obey, not to appear in
    Baku again', explains Artur Badalyan.

    Artur is confident all the pressures he underwent had one aim - make
    him go insane: `They were doing all that to make me mad, so that I
    wouldn't be be able to tell anything. They wanted my memory to become
    weak, so that they could say I was crazy.'

    Now is trying to recover with the help of his family. His son is 2.5
    years old now.

    For the tortures in captivity that Artur Badalyan suffered, Vanadzor
    town's `Populex' bar office plans to sue Azerbaijan. This is the first
    action in its form. They plan sending the suit to the European Court
    of Human Rights within a month.

    `A lot of things have changed. I have more goals now. I want to work
    to help my family out of the hardships, to restore everything,' dreams
    Artur.

    Translated by Narine Aghabekyan

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