Investigation into mine blast of Major General Hikmet Hasanov is underway

Baku/16.11.21/Turan: A criminal case is underway due to the explosion on mine of Major General Hikmet Hasanov, former commander of the First Army Corps of the Azerbaijani Armed Forces. This information was confirmed to Turan Agency by the press service of the General Prosecutor's Office.

"Owing to the fact that Major General Hikmet Hasanov was wounded by a mine explosion while driving an armored vehicle into the Agdam region liberated from the occupation on November 20, 2020, the Military Prosecutor's Office opened a criminal case, and the investigation is underway under Articles 29, 120. 2.7 (attempted premeditated murder of two and more persons) and 29, 120.2.12 (attempted murder motivated by ethnic, racial, religious hatred or enmity)," the General Prosecutor's Office said.

In recent days the local media have spread reports that as a result of an armored car bombing on November 20, 2020 (10 days after the end of the war) Hasanov was seriously wounded, including three fractures on his spine, and is still undergoing treatment.

At the same time, in Internet channels, former military men talk about Hasanov's involvement in tortures over the "Terter case." They also claim that it was due to Hasanov's fault that the April 2016 operation to liberate the village of Seysulan in the Terter region was failed and no support was sent to reinforce the military group in the liberated village of Talysh. Therefore, the Azerbaijani special forces, having not received reinforcements, were forced to retreat.

It is alleged that in order to ward off this failure the then leadership of the General Staff initiated a case of "treason" when hundreds of military personnel were detained. Dozens of them were convicted and 11 tortured to death.

All this time, Hasanov was silent expressing no attitude to the charges. In August this year, 46-year-old Hasanov was dismissed from his post as commander of the First Corps and demoted to deputy head of the military academy. Hasanov himself remained unavailable for comment.

Of interest is the fact that three days after Hasanov blew himself up in Agdam, Colonel Babek Samidli also blew himself up and died in Sugovushan.

According to former military intelligence officer Elmar Allahverdiyev, a former suspect in the "Terter case" and a subject of severe torture, Samidli was a close associate of Hasanov and also involved in fabricating accusations.

Azerbaijan's military prosecutor Khanlar Veliyev acknowledged the facts of tortures in a November 2 conversation with journalists.

 "We have established that more than 100 people were subjected to various forms of physical violence in connection with the Terter case."  According to him, although some people were prosecuted during the investigation, it later turned out that they were innocent: "Therefore, the criminal case against these people was terminated," Veliyev said.

According to Veliyev, before the Military Prosecutor's office investigated the suspected treason, serious physical violence was committed against them. As a result, one person was killed. Torture was used unlawfully on a massive scale against the servicemen. Therefore, criminal cases were immediately initiated against 16 different officials and they were sentenced to long terms of imprisonment. At the same time, Veliyev stated that the accusations against certain individuals due to the "Teter case" had no grounds.-06D-