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Court in Azerbaijan issues arrest warrant for ex-head of Karabakh’s government Vardanyan

Azerbaijani border guards arrested Ruben Vardanyan at the Lachin checkpoint as he was trying to leave for Armenia

BAKU, September 28. /TASS/. A court in the Azerbaijani capital Baku has announced an arrest warrant for Ruben Vardanyan, the former head of the unrecognized republic of Nagorno-Karabakh, according to APA news agency.

The decision followed an investigation by the State Security Service (SSS) of Azerbaijan.

"Judge Ulvia Shukyurova ruled on the arrest of Ruben Vardanyan for four months," the news agency reported.

Earlier on Thursday, the SSS said that Vardanyan faced charges of funding terrorism as well as creating and participating in illegitimate armed formations or groups and illegal crossing of the state border of the Republic of Azerbaijan.

Azerbaijani border guards arrested Vardanyan at the Lachin checkpoint as he was trying to leave for Armenia. He was escorted by rapid reaction officers to Baku.

Russian businessman Vardanyan co-founded Troika Dialog, Russia’s oldest brokerage company, in 1991 and also served as the first president of the Moscow School of Management Skolkovo. In September 2022, he renounced his Russian citizenship and moved to Nagorno-Karabakh, thanking Russia for his success in business and for deploying peacekeepers to the troubled region. Vardanyan was appointed the unrecognized republic’s state minister in November 2022 but was removed from his post in February 2023.

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