{"id":1406,"date":"2025-09-03T23:03:18","date_gmt":"2025-09-03T23:03:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/freearmenianhostages.net\/?p=1406"},"modified":"2025-09-03T23:06:43","modified_gmt":"2025-09-03T23:06:43","slug":"armenian-hostage-vicken-euljekjian-enters-fourth-week-of-hunger-strike","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/freearmenianhostages.net\/?p=1406","title":{"rendered":"Armenian hostage Vicken Euljekjian enters fourth week of hunger strike"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Euljekjian, 46, who was kidnapped by Azerbaijani troops five years ago, has been on a hunger strike for 21 days, CSI has learned<\/a>. His family in Lebanon is gravely concerned for his safety.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

CSI<\/a> has learned that Vicken Euljekjian, one of the\u00a023 Armenian hostages<\/a>\u00a0confirmed to be held by Azerbaijan, has been on a hunger strike for 21 days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Euljekjian\u2019s wife, Linda, learned of the hunger strike on September 2, when he was allowed to call her in Lebanon from his prison cell in Baku. Linda was alarmed by how weak her husband sounded on the phone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Euljekjian, 46, is a citizen of Armenia and Lebanon, who was kidnapped <\/a>by Azerbaijani troops in Nagorno Karabakh on November 10, 2020 \u2013 a day after a ceasefire between Armenia and Azerbaijan ended the Second Karabakh War. He is one of six civilian hostages held by Azerbaijan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is at least the third hunger strike<\/a> that Euljekjian has undertaken in recent years. In 2023, he went on a hunger strike for 24 days after his captors refused to let him speak to his wife in Arabic, insisting that he instead speak to her in Armenian \u2013 a language that she does not understand. In May this year, he went on a two-week hunger strike after he was denied permission to call his wife at all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since then, he has been allowed to call his wife once a month. In June, his phone call was reportedly facilitated by the ICRC, but since then, the ICRC has not been involved. Azerbaijan ordered <\/a>the ICRC to leave the country in March, and it is expected to end its operations in Azerbaijan this month<\/a>, shutting down one of the only points of contact for the Armenian hostages with the outside world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Throughout his five years of captivity, Euljekjian has been subjected to physical and mental abuse by his captors. According to a report <\/a>by the Center for Truth and Justice, when Euljekjian was first captured, he was beaten until he lost consciousness. He has also been subjected to mock executions. In televised interrogations, burns are visible on Euljekjian\u2019s hand where he once had a cross tattoo, suggesting that it has been burned off.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Euljekjian\u2019s captors have also reportedly denied him access to proper food and medical care for a digestive disorder, resulting in weight loss and pain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Euljekjian\u2019s family had been given reason to believe that, in the aftermath of the White House summit <\/a>on August 8 between the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan, Euljekjian and some of the other hostages would be released.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

U.S. President Donald Trump, who hosted the meeting, was heard speaking to Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan about the \u201c23 Christians,\u201d and saying, \u201cI am going to ask him to do that. I think he\u2019ll do it for me\u201d (most likely referring to Azerbaijan\u2019s President Ilham Aliyev).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Instead, when Euljekjian was allowed to call on September 2, his family was distressed to learn that he was not being released, and that he was on a hunger strike. He apparently began his hunger strike around August 13, a few days after the White House summit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since March 2024, CSI has sponsored<\/a> Euljekjian as part of the Libertas <\/a>campaign for the release of the Armenian prisoners.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Euljekjian, 46, who was kidnapped by Azerbaijani troops five years ago, has been on a hunger strike for 21 days, CSI has learned. His family in Lebanon is gravely concerned for his safety. CSI has learned that Vicken Euljekjian, one of the\u00a023 Armenian hostages\u00a0confirmed to be held by Azerbaijan, has been on a hunger strike […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1407,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,12,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1406","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-advocacy","category-english","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/freearmenianhostages.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1406","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/freearmenianhostages.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/freearmenianhostages.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freearmenianhostages.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freearmenianhostages.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1406"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/freearmenianhostages.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1406\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1411,"href":"https:\/\/freearmenianhostages.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1406\/revisions\/1411"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freearmenianhostages.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/freearmenianhostages.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1406"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freearmenianhostages.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1406"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freearmenianhostages.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1406"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}