Azerbaijan on Friday opened war crimes trials against Armenian separatists who led the breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region before it was recaptured by Baku in a lightning offensive in 2023.
Azerbaijan's seizure of the mountainous region ended nearly three decades of control by Armenian separatists, prompting the region's entire ethnic Armenian population -- more than 100,000 people -- to flee.
Baku arrested several of the separatist leaders on charges of "planning, preparing and initiating" alleged war crimes, including torture, "waging an aggressive war" and the "deportation or forced displacement of the population".
Armenia has denounced the separatist leaders' arrests and demanded their liberation.
Two trials -- one for 15 former officials, another for the region's billionaire former leader Ruben Vardanyan -- opened in the Azeri capital of Baku on Friday.
Among the 15 ex-officials are Karabakh's former self-styled presidents, Arkady Ghukasyan, Bako Sahakyan and Araik Harutyunyan.
Hearings in both trials were held behind closed doors, with only Azeri state media allowed to view the proceedings.
Vardanyan is a former banker who made his fortune in Russia and then ruled the breakaway region between November 2022 and February 2023.
He has denied the charges -- which could seem him jailed for life -- and declared himself a "political prisoner".
In a statement issued by his family on Thursday, he said: "I once again reiterate and state my complete innocence and the innocence of my Armenian compatriots also being held as political prisoners and demand an immediate end to this politically motivated case against us."
The court rejected a request by his lawyers to merge the two trials, state media reported.
Karabakh is internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan, but was controlled by pro-Armenian separatists for more than three decades.
The two Caucasus foes fought wars for control of the region at the end of the Soviet Union and again in 2020, before Azerbaijan seized the entire area in a 24-hour offensive in September 2023.
Armenia's foreign ministry said last year that it would take "all possible steps to protect the rights" of those being put on trial, "including in international courts".