On 8 December, 2020, Syrians for Truth and Justice (STJ) published the report “To Nagorno-Karabakh, not Libya: How did Russian Forces Trick Dozens of Syrians into Mercenarism in Armenia?” The report was the second documenting the transfer of Syrian fighters to the military conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia in the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh (also known as Artsakh).
After the report’s publication, several activists, journalists, and human rights defenders reached out to STJ with comments on the report’s subject matter and requests for further information. STJ deemed the comments and questions essential and legitimate to our mission to document human rights violations impartially and transparently; therefore, we returned to our sources, verified our information, and edited the report, now retitled: “Russia Recruits Syrian Fighters to Armenia.” In recognition of the comments we received, and for the sake of transparency, we are using this press release to address the major edits we made to the report.
Our report continues to be based on the testimonies of fighters who traveled to Armenia. Consequently, we returned to verify our sources. If we failed to reestablish contact with the source to ask clarifying questions, we removed their testimony. Notably, one fighter noted that he had registered his name with the Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia (ASALA), which we later learned was no longer active. STJ recognizes and apologizes for the unintentional mistake. The source quoted in the report came directly from the witness, with no omissions or exclusions on the part of STJ. Recognizing the error, and because we could not reestablish contact with the source to explain his meaning, we deleted the testimony. However, because we removed a testimony, we added three more from additional individuals who were recruited in Syria and transferred to Armenia, which you can read in the amended report.
Thanks to the help of commentators and activists, we also edited information regarding the burial place of three Armenian fighters who died in combat while in Armenia. In our original report, we quoted a young woman from Aleppo city who testified that the bodies of the three fighters were returned to Syria and buried in Aleppo. However, thanks to the diligence of our readers, we discovered that the young woman was mistaken and the three fighters were in fact buried in Armenia following a funeral service held at Saint Sargis Church in the city of Yerevan.
Our report, and its allegation that Syrians were recruited by Russia and sent to Armenia, is purely based on the testimonies collected. Unique, unrelated witnesses supplied the testimonies from different cities across Syria. STJ is not clear to what degree this recruitment was related to the war in Nagorno-Karabakh, which was launched by Azerbaijan rather than Armenia in late September, and in which Russia did not publicly play an active role. Russia has maintained a military presence in Armenia since the fall of the Soviet Union, and several of the sources we interviewed claimed they arrived prior to September. Our mission in this report was not to make assumptions about Russia’s intentions nor the intentions of the Syrian fighters traveling to Armenia, but instead to document and share the testimonies of Syrian fighters affiliated with pro-regime forces, notably from the 5th Legion, who were shipped to Armenia between September and November 2020.
STJ will continue to follow this story, corroborate evidence, and publish verified information. We sincerely appreciate the comments and questions following the original report, and will remain as transparent as possible in our documentation – and continue to make amends to that documentation when we are made aware of errors, ambiguities, and omissions. Our primary mission is the accurate documentation of human rights violations; therefore, we will continue to strive to seek and report the truth.