THE NUMBER ONE PRECEDENT

A citizen of three states was arrested in the capital of the fourth country on request of the fifth state, where after some time he was delivered in a special plane accompanied by representatives of the security services. Then the sixth state, which has nothing to do with this incident, goes hysterical.

Our "hero", Alexander Lapshin, is a native of Yekaterinburg. In 1989, he emigrated to Israel, as he had Jewish ancestry. In the early 2000s, he lived in Russia, managed to buy an apartment there although he was unemployed. In 2006, he arrived in Israel and was arrested due to his illegal visit to Syria. But then, the case has never reached the court.

After some time, he became a blogger and began sharing his travel impressions in LiveJournal trying to obtain the citizenship of various states. In addition to Russian and Israeli citizenship, Lapshin has managed to get a Ukrainian passport albeit he never lived in Ukraine. By the way, something strange happened with his Ukrainian citizenship: he boasted on his blog the way he managed to obtain the passport, then he complained that his citizenship was annulled. In addition, in the late '90s, Lapshin received a Green Card, and in 2011 filed an application for a Georgian citizenship to no avail though.

According to a well-known Israeli journalist, political and economic columnist of the web-channel ITON TV Alexander Gur-Arie, "Lapshin had thrown a lot of mud on Israel and Russia. He did it purposefully speaking not good enough about the country, and the people who live here. The reasons remain a mystery. He is a person who appears to be professionally engaged in provocations in order to promote himself". His russophobia is a separate issue. During his travels, Lapshin had never forgotten to accompany own photos with statements such as "while in Russia..." Often, humiliating the citizens of the Russian Federation with his words, Lapshin thus managed to ask for money for his trips from among the Russians. A typical portrait of a liberal hypocrite. By the way, his blog is a collection of tips on how to cheat and fool others with as little expense as possible.

In search of cheap fame Lapshin visited Armenian-occupied territories of Azerbaijan in April 2011 and October 2012 without getting permission of official Baku. In his publications in LiveJournal, he has promoted the separatist Nagorno-Karabakh regime thus being declared persona non grata by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Azerbaijan. However, this did not calm this "funny traveler".

In 2016, using his Ukrainian passport, Lapshin was able to enter the territory of Azerbaijan through Georgia. However, as it turned out, he was deprived of the Ukrainian citizenship long before that. Anyway, this is a claim made by the embassies of Ukraine and Belarus on Facebook.

That is, in fact penetrated into the country, where he was blacklisted, with a forged document, Lapshin then began to boast in their networks "feat". As a result, law enforcement agencies of Azerbaijan opened a criminal case against Alexander Lapshin in connection with violation of two articles of the Criminal Code. In particular, 281.2 (open calls against the state) and 318.2 (illegal crossing the state border of Azerbaijan). In the end, December 15 in Minsk, at the request of Azerbaijan Alexander Lapshin was arrested and extradited to Azerbaijan.

The Prosecutor General's Office of Belarus declare that neither Russia nor Israel have not turned to him with a request for the extradition of its citizens Lapshin. Moreover, the acts of which he is accused in Azerbaijan, and are punishable under Belarusian criminal law. Now that he was extradited to Baku, the issue of the further fate of Lapshin will depend on the completion of the investigation. The final decision of the court.

The Azerbaijani side is opposed to the politicization of the process: "All the time he is called a blogger. And if he was an engineer, they would not be interested? He broke the law, and in accordance with the legal justification for a criminal case on the basis of which was placed a request to Interpol, according to which it and detained the Belarusian side. In accordance with the Kishinev Convention in the framework of the CIS. Everything is done in the framework of the law ", - said the head of the Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov in his interview to RIA" Novosti ".

Any visit to the occupied territories of foreign nationals primarily serves the legitimization of the occupation. Anyone can try, arrived in Azerbaijan to travel to Karabakh. However, for obvious reasons, this trip will end in the Agdam and Fizuli: stand on the occupation forces of Armenia. Lapshin is accused not only of unauthorized visit to the occupied territories. He has also repeatedly questioned the territorial integrity of the state, violated the border, entering in Baku, including in the "black list", openly and cynically mocking laws. Such actions are already criminal nature under international law, regardless of the profession man. After all, the right to freedom of expression is not an absolute right and may be limited by certain factors. If the first part of the 10th paragraph of the European Convention on Human Rights protects the freedom, the second indicates specifically to those cases where this freedom can be restricted, and one of them are the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety. On this issue, spoke ambiguously known Russian political scientist, historian Oleg Kuznetsov. "I have seen the publication of Lapshin in social networks. He knew that he was committing a crime, and, nevertheless, proud, boasted, boasted of it. Accordingly, he was a criminal. Therefore, should be responsible under the law for their actions, and there is nothing extraordinary, "- said O. Kuznetsov.

The political scientist also expressed his opinion regarding the attempts to politicize the extradition blogger. "Lapshin has never hidden the fact that he was on the instructions of the Armenian mocks the Azerbaijani state. It is clear that customers are trying to politicize the situation... Yes, in one of his status, he wrote, that I am at number 15 in the "black list" of Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry. Now I want to be number one. Yes, it will be number one on the list of those who have been convicted of illegally crossing the state border of Azerbaijan. He reached her, but could not imagine that his swan song so quickly over, "- said O. Kuznetsov.

Despite the fact that Azerbaijan urges not to politicize "the case of Lapshin", this process has become a kind of test for the relationship of official Baku with a number of other countries. Belarus has once again demonstrated its commitment to the allied relations with Azerbaijan, despite the risk of spoiling relations with other partners. According to the Belarusian political analyst Yuri Drakakhrust, "Lukashenko understands that because of the extradition of a blogger in Azerbaijan with Israel and Russia may deteriorate. But the weight of these relations does not exceed its relations with Azerbaijan." On the other hand, as noted above, international law, too, is on the side of the official Minsk.

"The issue of transfer of Azerbaijan blogger Lapshin lay exclusively in the legal field", said Head of Information, Press Secretary of the Belarusian Foreign Ministry Dmitry Mironchik. He stressed that his country faithfully complied with its obligations under international legal assistance. "Contracts must be respected," said Foreign Ministry’s spokesman.

However, the Belarusian law-enforcement authorities and could ignore the request of Azerbaijan, as it previously did some other countries, among which, unfortunately, including Ukraine. It would seem that the official Kiev, which has big problems with the territorial integrity of the country, detention and extradition Lapshin had to make the default. However, apparently, the ethnic roots of the Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine, Baku Armenian Arsen Avakov took precedence over norms of the Ukrainian and international law.

The position of Israel in the case of Lapshin distinguished restraint and pragmatism, despite the fact that Israel is a country, which can start a war for any of its citizens, as it was in June 2006. Then, the Israeli army launched a military operation to rescue the Army Corporal Gilad Shalit. However, in the case of Lapshin, despite the blogger was most appreciated because of his Israeli passport, things are different. During a conversation between the Israeli journalist, political and economic commentator Alexander Gur-Ariye and the host of Sputnik Belarus Vyacheslav Sharapov, the former said that now in Israel mostly there is a perception that Israel "should not take any crazy effort to rescue the blogger." "First of all, in our opinion, does not threaten anything supernatural. He did not receive any 15-year period, or something like that. Secondly, go to conflict situations and bargaining with Azerbaijan in order to free this man, I personally do not think it is necessary," said Gur-Ariye.

Immediately after the arrest of Lapshin in Minsk, many experts were waiting for the reaction of Russia. There are several reasons: first, Lapshin has Russian citizenship, and secondly, his extradition from Belarus took place at times inappropriate for Russian-Belarusian relations. Hence the attempts to present this action as a public demarche of the Belarusian president.

Also, there is a powerful Armenian lobby in Russia, which had hoped to drive a wedge between the relationship between Moscow and Baku. Indeed, the first time the reaction of some Russian officials and politicians was not that pragmatic. However, further manifestations of "concern" on the part of the Russian Foreign Ministry and the hysterical statements of Vladimir Zhirinovsky did not do the trick.

Firstly, the Russian law enforcement agencies know well about the legality of Lapshin’s extradition. Secondly, Moscow is well aware that with excessive politicization of the issue with the "blogger" they can be reminded about the case of another Russian citizen, Dilgam Askerov, the fate of whom for some reason is not interesting for anybody. But unlike Lapshin, Dilgam Askerov, who for the past two and a half years is a hostage of the Armenian regime in the occupied territories of Azerbaijan, had not violated the boundaries of foreign states and was imprisoned only because he tried to visit his native village, the graves of his ancestors.

Either way, the course of events showed that the case Lapshin would not spoil the relations between Russia and Azerbaijan. "... Every person, regardless of his citizenship, must respect the laws of the Republic of Azerbaijan. Azerbaijan has been fighting for the occupied Nagorno-Karabakh. One of the duties of Azerbaijan is prevention of visits to Nagorno Karabakh by foreign nationals. I think that the incident Lapshin will be a lesson for those who paid a visit to Nagorno-Karabakh, and who wanted to go there, and the number of trips to the region will decrease," said one of the closest to the Kremlin political analyst Sergei Markov. He regarded Lapshin’s extradition as "the success rate and power of Azerbaijan."

A response of the Spokeswoman of the Russian Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova to the question of the Armenian journalist about Russia's position in "Lapshin’s case" can be considered a bold point. "It is gratifying that the Armenian media is so concerned about the Russian-Azerbaijani relations," said Zakharova in her usual sarcastic manner.

What is so concerned about Armenia - a country that has no relationship to either citizenship Lapshin, nor to the question of extradition, nor, especially, the fight for freedom of speech?!

Firstly, for many years, Armenia is trying to present the independence of "NKR" as a fait accompli, organizing visits to the occupied territories of Azerbaijan of such people as Lapshin. That some shows with elections and the involvement of "international observers", something else with some similar events Yerevan is constantly trying to increase the number of "friends of Karabakh." Secondly, Armenians hoped that States whose nationals Lapshin is, will prevent his extradition to Baku, which would mean "another diplomatic victory" over Azerbaijan. Now, when everything happened exactly the opposite, Armenia has no choice but to politicize the issue, once again expressing disappointment actions of its partners in the CSTO and EAEC.

"This move is contrary to relations within the CSTO. We must raise the issue of Belarus, the termination of the membership in this organization," said the head of the parliamentary faction of the Republican Party Vahram Baghdasaryan. One of the opposition leaders Hrant Bagratyan also made a proposal to exclude Belarus from the CSTO and EAEC. A leader of the "Prosperous Armenia" faction Naira Zohrabyan said that "Armenia cannot but respond to the unprecedented arrogance and cynicism of the authorities of Belarus. If Armenia considers itself worthy of a state, it is necessary to freeze membership in the Collective Security Treaty Organization, and to withdraw our ambassador, as long as we do not give a legal solution to the issue." Even the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Armenia, violating all diplomatic norms, actually called the Belarusian authorities a "dictatorship". Foreign Ministry’s spokesman Tigran Balayan said that the extradition of a blogger is "a flagrant violation of fundamental human rights, freedom of speech and the right to free movement, which once again demonstrated a huge gap between dictatorship and democracy."

It is interesting that calls for fundamental human rights and freedom of speech come from the country where the member of parliament has publicly promised to rape and behead all those who dare to say anything to the press about the ex-Minister of Defense Seyran Ohanyan and his wife. About human rights and freedom of speech speaks a country where in March 2008, the authorities simply shot the people protesting against election fraud, killing, according to official data, more than ten people.

By the way, even the European institutions did not support Yerevan’s ranting about the protection of freedom of speech. "Nobody has the right to carry out illegal entry into their territory, and no one has to avoid responsibility for the commission of a criminal offense", said PACE Vice President George Logvinsky on the situation with Lapshin’s arrest. But that's not all.

Calling the actions of its partners in the EAEC and the CSTO (Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan) treacherous, Armenia in fact admits that its hopes to use regional integration initiatives against Azerbaijan are not justified. For the umpteenth time the member states of these organizations let Armenia know that their actions are guided by the international law and national interests and they are not going to sacrifice their relations with Azerbaijan for Armenia's whims. Belarus and Kazakhstan refused to support Yerevan within the framework of the CSTO, even in the case of a full-fledged war between Azerbaijan and Armenia. And Armenia's chairmanship in CSTO same has not yet been approved because of the open opposition of Astana and Minsk, as well as with the tacit consent of Moscow.

All of the above can best be summarized with the words of the spokesman of the Armenian opposition party "Heritage" David Sanasaryan: "After a precedent with Lapshin, none sober foreigner visits Nagorno Karabakh. Azerbaijan shattered us with a score of 10:0. Armenia retains its membership in two rotten organizations - the CSTO and EAEC, in which it has not a single ally. On the contrary, the member states of these organizations are allies of Azerbaijan."