“Ramin’s uncles went to collect his body. They looked at the corpse. They say the bullets struck from the head and from under the jaw. There were three bullet wounds. How can a person who shoots himself fire three bullets at himself? He would die or lose consciousness from the first round and fall to the ground. So who fired the other two?”
The body of soldier Ramin Cəbrayılov, who died at military unit “N” of the State Border Service (SBS) located in the town of Horadiz, was handed over to his relatives on May 24. Şaiq Balakişiyev, who spoke to Qəzetçi, said he does not believe his relative died by suicide.
According to him, after the body was handed over to the family, they were not permitted to have it examined, and were told that the deceased had been washed and shrouded at the Beyləqan mosque.
“He had lost his father at a young age. He was the only son in the family. They did not even allow his mother and sisters to see Ramin’s face one last time,” Şaiq Balakişiyev said.
On the evening of the day his body was handed over to relatives, Ramin was buried in the village of Çalov in the Qobustan district under the supervision of police and Border Troops officers and soldiers. Photography and video recording were not permitted at the funeral.
“He was 25 years old. He had graduated from the Technical University with distinction and gone on to complete a master’s degree. He joined the army of his own insistence — he had already been exempted from military service due to his weight. He trained consistently for a year, went on a diet, lost the weight, volunteered for the army, and came home a corpse,” Balakişiyev said.
Şaiq Balakişiyev added that because Ramin Cəbrayılov had a higher education, he served at headquarters and did not complain even once throughout his five months of service.
“The colonel who came to the funeral said Ramin was an exemplary soldier. Why would an exemplary soldier — one who volunteered for service — commit suicide?” asked Balakişiyev, noting that many questions surrounding his relative’s death remain unanswered.
The family was informed by the State Border Troops that samples had been taken from Ramin’s body at the Beyləqan District Hospital and sent for forensic examination.
“They did not allow us to see his body. We had no way of knowing whether there were any injury marks on it. But by law, his relatives should have been able to see him,” Balakişiyev stressed.
The State Border Service has not issued an official statement regarding Ramin Cəbrayılov’s death. But his case is not the first to be recorded this year.
According to information circulating in open sources, five SBS servicemen have died in the first five months of 2025. Four of them are reported to have died by suicide.
In January, Senior Lieutenant Şamo Əliyev, serving at an SBS military unit in the city of Yevlax, was reported to have died by suicide using a firearm. In April, reports emerged that Əsəd İsmayıllı, a first-year student at the SBS Academy, had died by suicide.
On May 15, İslamov Məzahir Qurbanəli oğlu, a student at the SBS special school, died by suicide. On May 20, Hüseyn Əsədov, a soldier of only 20 days’ service, lost his life. His death is reported to have been caused by illness.
Cəsur Sümərinli, head of the Caspian Military Research Center, told Qəzetçi that at least 62 SBS servicemen have died since the ceasefire agreement signed in 2020.
“Of the 62, 22 died as a result of suicide, and 12 lost their lives due to various illnesses. During the reporting period, at least 6 were killed. Five died of unknown causes,” the expert stated.
Commenting on the rising death toll, the expert believes serious reforms must be carried out within the SBS: “It has become clear that the moral and psychological condition of servicemen in the State Border Service is poor. This gives grounds to say that there are cases of ‘dedovshchina,’ there is violence, and there are conflicts in soldier-soldier and soldier-commander relations.”
SBS chief General-Colonel Elçin Quliyev, in an interview with the newspaper Azərbaycan in September 2022, stated that 47 SBS servicemen were killed during the Second Karabakh War.
Thus, the number of deaths in Azerbaijan’s Border Troops over the past five years has surpassed the losses the SBS sustained during the last Karabakh war.