 In December 1918 Trabzon deputy Hafız Mehmet gave a speech at the Ottoman parliament in which he blamed the former governor of Trebizond Vilayet Cemal Azmi – who had fled to Germany after the Russian invasion – for orchestrating the Armenian Genocide in the city in 1915, by means of drowning.Subsequently, a series of war crimes trials were held in Trebizond in early 1919 (see Trebizond during the Armenian Genocide).Among others, Cemal Azmi was sentenced to death in absentia.