Armenian prisoners of war Davit Davtyan and Gevorg Sujyan were sentenced to 15 years in prison in Azerbaijan on Wednesday, July 28, local media reported.

They were charged with "espionage and violation of the state border".

Days earlier, a court in Baku sentenced 26 Armenian PoWs illegally being held in Azerbaijan to six years in prison. All the 26 men will be deported after serving their prison terms, according to a decision from the country's serious crimes court.

Earlier in July, Azerbaijan sentenced 14 members of Armenia’s armed forces to various jail terms, while Viken Euljekjian, an Armenian captive and a citizen of Lebanon, was handed a 20-year jail term in mid-June.

Azerbaijan is refusing to return all Armenian prisoners of war, in violation of the statement on the cessation of hostilities signed by the parties in November 2020. The Armenian side has information about some 200 Armenians still in Azerbaijan’s captivity, but Azeri President Ilham Aliyev claims that persons being kept in Baku are not PoWs, but “terrorists and saboteurs”. At least 19 of the hundreds of Armenian captives have been tortured and killed, according to their lawyers.