Category: 2022

The UK Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Minister for the Armed Forces), James Heappey, has arrived in Azerbaijan on a one-day visit, Turan reports.

Meetings with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, Minister of Defense Zakir Hasanov, and Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov are scheduled.

Matters of expanding cooperation in the defense sector, the situation in Ukraine, as well as the unresolved issues with Armenia and the course of the respective peace process will be discussed during these meetings.

The British minister will discuss also cooperation in demining.

YEREVAN. – Anna Karapetyan, a representative of the Human Rights Defender (Ombudsperson) of Armenia, participated in the OSCE Supplementary Human Dimension Meeting I, entitled “International co-operation to address violations of international humanitarian law and international human rights law,” which took place on Monday and Tuesday in Vienna, Austria, informed the Office of the Human Rights Defender.

Issues related to the requirements and application of international humanitarian law and human rights law were discussed during the meeting, focusing on the situation of the civilian population in conflict zones and the impact of the conflict on them; best practice in documenting and investigating human rights and international humanitarian law violations, including issues related to digital technologies supporting national human rights institutions.

During the meeting, the representative of the Office of the Human Rights Defender made a speech, referring to the human rights and international humanitarian law violations by Azerbaijan during the Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) war, as well as the humanitarian crisis in Artsakh as a result of the war.

The representative of the Office of the Human Rights Defender presented the violations of international humanitarian law against the border population of the Republic of Armenia by the Azerbaijani side, the human rights violations and the torture of prisoners of war by the Azerbaijani authorities, referring to the facts presented in the ad hoc reports of the Human Rights Defender.

In particular, the fact that the presence of the Azerbaijani armed forces has posed serious humanitarian problems to the border residents of Armenia was mentioned in the speech. Due to the behavior of the Azerbaijani authorities, which violate all well-known norms of international law, people in Artsakh have been deprived of gas supply for weeks, which disturbs the implementation of the latter’s right to health, education, work, and other fundamental rights. The recent aggressive acts of Azerbaijan have caused not only social but also serious security issues.

The representative of the Office of the Human Rights Defender made a particular reference to the urgency of the need to return the prisoners of war and civilian captives still held in Azerbaijan.

During the speech, the criminal behavior of Azerbaijan was strongly condemned, and a call was made to national human rights institutions and international organizations to act to stop the genocidal policy against Azerbaijan. In their speech, the representative of the Office of the Human Rights Defender emphasized the importance of securing the presence of international organizations in conflict zones, both during and in the post-conflict periods, as a mechanism of guaranteeing and protecting the rights of the civilian population.

If there is no evidence, it must be invented. This is exactly what the Azerbaijani authorities are guided by, distorting the facts without any shame and, if necessary, pulling the “evidence” out of the sleeve with the dexterity of an illusionist. In this case – bones and skulls.

As Azerbaijani authorities informed on Wednesday, the Azerbaijani military, which invaded the Karabakh village of Parukh on 24 March, “discovered” some remains, and it is already claimed that they were “tortured” Azerbaijanis in the first Karabakh war.

“These are supposed to be Azerbaijani soldiers who died fighting with Armenian occupants for the village and nearby heights,” the Azerbaijani media write, without asking what the Azerbaijani soldiers were doing near the Armenian village and who is the occupant here. Obviously, they were doing what they are doing today – trying to capture the village.

The Azerbaijani military “discovered” many such “graves”. And now the Azerbaijani authorities will try to use this falsified “evidence” to appeal to international courts, accusing the Armenian army of “inhuman treatment of prisoners and civilians.

The Azerbaijani authorities, who are doing their best to encourage Armenophobia and Aliyev, who personally rewarded literally thugs, are now busy creating “evidence” of the crimes allegedly committed by Armenians.  Accusing the Armenian side of not providing data on the burial sites, Azerbaijan itself is in no hurry to hand over the live prisoners, nor to report the burial sites of about a thousand Armenians who died in the first war.

Britain strengthens the positions of the Azerbaijani-Turkish tandem in the region, Artsakh State Minister Artak Beglaryan wrote on his Facebook.

“What does Britain have to do with Azerbaijan’s recent aggression against the security guarantees of Artsakh and Russia?

In these days when Azerbaijan is again occupying settlements and strategic heights of Artsakh, the British Minister of the Armed Forces is in Baku, and the Karabakh conflict is discussed with the Azerbaijani ambassador to London.

We saw open British support for Azerbaijan in 2020 during the Azerbaijani-Turkish aggression. Even now, during the occupation of Parukh and Karaglukh, Britain is not hiding its strategic support, and we can only guess at the size and nature of the actual support.

This is done both in order to strengthen the position of the Azerbaijani-Turkish tandem in the region, and in order to now strike a blow to Russia’s vital interests, as a result of which the lives and security of the indigenous people of Artsakh are trampled.

Human rights and democracy, praised by the West, are absolutely impossible in such dirty geopolitical games,” he wrote.