Azeri Army Murders Probed

Killing of officers lifts lid on Azerbaijan army’s culture of bullying.

By Sabuhi Mammadli in Baku (CRS No. 530, 05-Feb-10)

The army is continuing to investigate the killing last month of four officers by two conscripts who then committed suicide, in the latest sign of a worrying rise in violence within military ranks.

Shovqiyya Azizova, the mother of Elkhan Azizov, one of the two conscripts, told Azerbaijan television that her son had been bullied in the army.

“I spoke to him on the phone. They tormented him. I don’t know exactly what they did with my child. He did not give names. But they insulted him. He told me not to tell anyone and I, like an idiot, did what he told me,” she said.

A system of organised bullying – called “dedovshchina” – was endemic in the Soviet armed forces, and was employed to force new recruits to obey those who had served longer periods of conscription. Older recruits would beat younger ones, forcing them to carry out the most menial tasks.

Despite attempts to halt the practice, and its abandonment as an officially-condoned form of disciplining new recruits, bullying has survived in the militaries of many of the former Soviet countries, including Azerbaijan.

Evidence suggests that attacks by conscripts on their officers are becoming worryingly common. At the start of May last year, an 18-year-old shot his commander, a fellow conscript and then himself. A few days later, a 20-year-old junior sergeant shot four other soldiers on the Seyfali firing range near the city of Ganja.

Jasur Sumaranli, director of the Doktrina Centre of Military Investigations, said that in January alone the army lost five soldiers in unknown circumstances.

“In 2009, the loss was 63. Of those just 12 servicemen died in military action. The others died of various diseases, including from food poisoning, as a result of suicide or in unknown circumstances,” he said.

The casualties of the January 28 attack by Azizov and his best friend Sadig Mammadov included two wounded officers, who are in a critical condition in hospital.

Shafahat Imranov, Azerbaijan’s deputy military prosecutor, said the details of the crime were yet to be gathered.

“An investigative group is currently at the site of the crime but there is currently no definite explanation for what happened,” he said.

Mammadov’s father, however, was certain that only some kind of abuse could have provoked his son to resort to murder.

“If a soldier took his weapon into his hand and shot his own officers, it means there were problems between them. This is for sure,” Etibar Mammadov said.

Veterans contacted by IWPR confirmed that bullying is rife in the army. Yashar Jafarli, the chairman of the Retired and Reserve Officers Organisation, said dedoshchina as a disciplining technique had been phased out, but it had been replaced by a culture of brutality and theft.

“Officers on many bases take money from soldiers and their relatives. And those soldiers who cannot from time to time pay their commanders, or buy them credits for their phones, are targeted for abuse and even beaten. I think that this was the situation in these tragedies,” he said.

Recently-returned conscripts told IWPR the situation for them on military bases had come close to being unbearable at times.
Arif Qasimov, a 22-year-old, said money was now the crucial factor, rather than pure seniority as it had been in Soviet times.

“The strong are considered to be those with money. The officers are always demanding money from the soldiers; the older soldiers take it from the younger. If you have no money, you will be tormented,” he said.

“You cannot appeal to anyone. If you appeal to the higher command, then your appeal is just passed back to your own commanders. After that the situation gets even worse, so soldiers prefer to keep quiet about their troubles. Often they don’t even tell their parents, so as not to make the situation worse.”

In the circumstances, many Azeris’ sympathies in this case seemed to be with the murderers rather than with their victims, perhaps reflecting their own experiences in the army or as relatives of conscripts.

Azad Isazade, a psychologist in Baku, said he could not guess what kind of torments the conscripts must have been going through to take such a desperate step.

“If soldiers with just two or three months until their return home killed their officers and themselves, that means they were driven to despair. You can only imagine what hellish tortures they had to live through. On military bases there are basically no psychologists who could have helped these soldiers in time,” he said.

Jafarli said not all units suffered from these problems, and that bases of the border guards and interior ministry troops were far more disciplined.

“It is necessary to take serious steps to stop negative developments and enforce order in the whole army,” he said.

Officials said the investigation was still ongoing, and that two officers on the base had been arrested in connection with the January 28 shooting.

“The president himself is overseeing the investigation of this tragedy,” said Zakir Garalov, general prosecutor of Azerbaijan.

Defence ministry spokesman Eldar Sabiroqlu declined to comment on the facts of the case, until the investigation was complete.

“A group, including representatives of the defence ministry and the military tribunal, is conducting an internal investigation. Those guilty in this tragedy will definitely be punished,” he said.

Sabuhi Mammadli is a reporter from Azadliq newspaper.