Armenian prisoner in Azerbaijan 'fighting for life' as health fails

Ludwig Mkrtchyan

The family of an Armenian volunteer fighter jailed in Azerbaijan say his health has severely deteriorated due to a lack of medical care.

Ludvig Mkrtchyan, who was captured during the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war, is reportedly suffering from serious heart damage, chest pains, and dangerously high blood pressure.

His lawyer, Luciana Minassian, wrote on social media platform X that Mkrtchyan was "fighting for his life in Azerbaijani prison".

Minassian accused authorities of "deliberate medical neglect", adding that the prisoner of war has received "no real treatment".

Mkrtchyan was sentenced to 20 years in prison in 2021 on war crimes charges dating back to the First Nagorno-Karabakh War in the 1990s. His family maintains his innocence.

Speaking to the broadcaster RFE/RL, his wife, Hranush Shahbazyan, said she was deeply concerned by his physical and mental decline.

"Although they keep telling him that everything is fine, he himself says he is in very bad shape," Shahbazyan said. "Even when he speaks, he struggles badly and becomes short of breath."

Shahbazyan said she is only permitted to speak to her husband on the telephone once every 40 days for about 10 minutes.

She added that no medical staff are available at the prison after 16:00, and that Mkrtchyan had not been given the results of a recent electrocardiogram (ECG) test.

The family is currently waiting for Azerbaijani authorities to submit his medical files to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), which has ordered Baku to provide updates on detained Armenians.

Mkrtchyan is one of 19 known Armenian prisoners still held in Azerbaijan, a group that includes former political and military leaders of the breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region.

In January, Azerbaijan released a group of four detainees, at least two of whom returned to Armenia in critical physical and psychological conditions.

Families of those still held say obtaining information has become increasingly difficult since the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) suspended its operations in Azerbaijan in September 2025.

Shahbazyan said her husband was growing increasingly hopeless about ever returning home to Armenia's Ararat Province.

"If there is peace, then at the very least the humanitarian aspect should be ensured," she said. "But I still do not see that."