Ruben Vardanyan, a former senior official in Nagorno-Karabakh de facto administration, attending a court hearing in Baku, Azerbaijan, February 17, 2026. Screen grab taken from a video.
Ruben Vardanyan, a former senior official in Nagorno-Karabakh's de facto administration who is serving a 20-year prison sentence in Azerbaijan, says that he and 18 other Armenian prisoners are being denied regular family contact, adequate exercise, medical tests, and other rights provided under Azerbaijani law.
In an audio appeal recorded on September 16 and published two days later, Vardanyan addressed Azerbaijan's human rights commissioner, Sabina Aliyeva. He said some prisoners at Umbaki prison do not receive weekly phone calls and none can make video calls. "When my cellmate was arrested, his child was 10 months old," Vardanyan said. "Now the child is more than 3 years old and has not seen his father."
Vardanyan said he has been unable to get medical tests even at his own expense, access notary services, or receive written responses to complaints. He said prisoners get only 20 to 40 minutes of outdoor exercise once a week, rather than an hour a day.
Human Rights Watch has not independently verified these allegations.
On September 19, Aliyeva’s office rejected the allegations that the prisoners’ rights were being violated.
The prisoners' contact with their families became more difficult after the Azerbaijani government closed down the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) delegation there in September 2025. The ICRC says Geneva-based representatives visited detainees in December, met them privately, offered opportunities to communicate with their families, and assessed their treatment and detention conditions. However, visits are now less regular.
Vardanyan was detained in September 2023 while leaving Nagorno-Karabakh for Armenia, along with more than 100,000
