Azerbaijan detains foreign illegal armed group member PHOTO

Azerbaijan's State Security Service has detained a member of a foreign illegal armed group.

As part of the State Security Service's complex operational and investigative measures to combat international terrorism, an Uzbek citizen, Ilyerjon Isanov, was detained and arrested on suspicion of participation in an armed terrorist organisation operating on Turkiye territory, Caliber.Az reports, quoting the service's official website.

Then, due to a lack of evidence of guilt, he was released. However, reasonable suspicions were later established in the participation of an Azerbaijani citizen, Akif Osmanov (born 1977), in religiously motivated armed conflicts and terrorist acts outside the country.

Following an investigation into the initiated criminal case, it was discovered that Akif Osmanov, while undergoing training in a special training camp in the Syrian city of Atma, based on radicalism and religious hatred, and having mastered the rules for using firearms and explosives, participated in the activities of an illegal armed group known as "Azeri Jamaat."

Osmanov is also said to have taken part in the battles for Sheikh Suleiman village with other members of the group, suffering shrapnel wounds.

The investigation also revealed that the terrorist organisation provided Osmanov with a forged passport in the name of an Uzbek citizen in order for him to freely travel around the territory of other countries and avoid criminal prosecution.

Following a court decision, Osmanov was detained as a suspect and prosecuted under articles 12.1, 279.1 (creation of armed formations or groups not provided for by Azerbaijani legislation, as well as participation in their creation and activities, supplying them with weapons, ammunition, explosives, military vehicles, or a serviceman's kit) of the Azerbaijani Criminal Code.

The criminal investigation into the case is still ongoing, the State Security Service added.