RA Prosecutor General`s Office: There are criminal schemes for the  mass recruitment of mercenaries in Syria to be involved in military  operations against Artsakh

ArmInfo. 1st November 2020 The servicemen of Artsakh AO discovered the second citizen of the Syrian Arab Republic, a resident of the village of Ziadia, Idlib State, Yussef El Abed El Aji, 1988. birth, participating in the Armed  Forces of the Republic of Azerbaijan in hostilities unleashed against  the Republic of Artsakh.

Last November 2nd, 2020 was detained on  suspicion of committing crimes under Article 389, paragraph 1 of part  1, paragraph 1 of part 3 of Article 390 and part 3 of Article 395 of  the RA Criminal Code.

According to the press service of the General Prosecutor's Office of  Armenia, during the preliminary investigation in the relevant  criminal case, new factual data were obtained about the presence of  mercenaries recruited from other countries, in particular from Syria,  as members of terrorist groups in the Armed Forces of Azerbaijan and  their direct involvement in war activities. In particular, according  to the testimony of Youssef El Abed El Aji, a man named Abu Ahmad in  his house offered him for money to go to Azerbaijan in order to  participate in a three-month military exercise on the condition that  he would be paid $ 2,000 a month.

The recruitment was carried out in Sarafin, Saham, Al Ziyedi and  other Syrian settlements, the mercenaries were specially warned not  to take an identity document, a mobile phone. They were taken to the  Bab al- Salam checkpoint in Syria, which the Syrian mercenary said is  under the control of Abu Khamshi and his militants. Of the hundreds  of people gathered there from various parts of Syria, brother Abu  Khamshi-Seif recruited 500 people between the ages of 20 and 40, who  were warned in advance that after a trip to Azerbaijan no one would  be allowed to return until the term expired. Then, the finally  recruited above 500 recruits without hindrance, without checking the  identity documents by Turkish law enforcement officers, passed  through the above border checkpoint on the border of Syria and  Turkey, got on buses and, accompanied by the Turkish military, went  to one of the civilian airports in Turkey, from there by plane with a  Turkish flag - to another civil airport, after which, again without  checking identity documents, they boarded a civil plane with an  Azerbaijani flag and went to Azerbaijan, to a civil airport.

 Here they were met by the military in the uniform of the Turkish  army, as well as the Armed Forces of Azerbaijan, and again, without  checking the identity of the arrivals, they were taken by buses to  the military unit, where there were both Azerbaijani and Turkish  servicemen. In the indicated military unit, they were given necklaces  with numbers, uniforms of light and dark blue, and weapons, including  knives. Three days later, the mercenaries were transferred to another  location. According to the information received, the leader of this  group of mercenaries was a man named Sheikh Ibrahim, under the  leadership of the latter they were transferred to another military  unit, where there were another 500 Syrian Arabs who had arrived to  fight for money, as well as Turkish-Azerbaijani soldiers. In the  military unit, they were divided into 10 groups, the composition and  number of which was determined by Abu Khamsha, who is the main leader  of the indicated military unit and mercenaries transferred from Syria  to Azerbaijan. The latter, announcing that they would fight against  the Armenians, gave instructions not to spare any of the Armenians in  the event of an attack, to "slaughter" them all and kill them. They  also received such instructions from the Turkish- Azerbaijani  military in the military unit. According to Youssef El Abed El Haji,  they were promised $ 100 for each Armenian beheaded. Early in the  morning on the seventh day of their stay in this military unit, at 4  o'clock they moved to the Artsakh-Azerbaijan contact line, where  Sheikh Ibrahim ordered them to attack the neighboring Armenian  village, capture it and behead all civilians and soldiers there.  However, during the attack, they came under fire from the Armenian  side, leaving 15 killed and fled. During the operation, Yusef was  wounded, in this state he stayed in the field for three days, until  he was taken prisoner by Armenian soldiers. The aforementioned  factual data, in combination with other evidence, confirm the  existence of clearly operating criminal schemes for the mass  recruitment of mercenaries in various parts of Syria to be involved  in military operations against Artsakh as part of the Armed Forces of  Azerbaijan in exchange for material compensation, as well as the  commission of crimes motivated by national hatred.  transfer to  Azerbaijan through Turkey and with the participation of the armed  forces of the latter, illegal involvement in the Armed Forces of  Azerbaijan and ensuring their participation in hostilities with the  aim of committing acts of a mainly terrorist nature.