Azerbaijan appeals to int'l institutions concerning Armenia's war crimes against civilians

  27 September 2021    Read: 516
Azerbaijan appeals to int

Azerbaijan’s State Committee on Family, Women and Children Affairs has appealed to international organizations regarding September 27 - Remembrance Day, AzVision.az reports.

As the appeal reads, war crimes committed by the Armenian Armed Forces during the 44-day second Karabakh war against the Azerbaijani civilian population living in cities and towns far from the combat zone, brutally killed 12 children, and 35 were received injuries of varying severity.

As many as 181 children lost one, 5 - both parents, one family was completely destroyed, the appeal said.

“As a result of the military aggression by Armenia, which lasted for about 30 years, over 23,000 Azerbaijanis were killed, 50,000 were wounded or became disabled, about 4,000 citizens of Azerbaijan are still missing. In all the de-occupied territories of Azerbaijan, more than 700,000 Azerbaijanis were subjected to ethnic cleansing. As many as 250,000 of the Azerbaijani population were expelled from their ancestral lands in the late 1980s,” said the appeal.

“During the first Karabakh war, 210 children were killed, 270 lost their health, 92 children were taken hostage. In addition, 3,393 children lost one, and 120 children lost both parents. During the occupation of 20 percent of the Azerbaijani territories by Armenia, Azerbaijan was one of the countries with the largest number of refugees and internally displaced persons in the world. As a result of the intensive shelling of the territories of Azerbaijan far from the conflict zone by Armenia, which widely used the tactics of terror in the second Karabakh war to plunge the population into horror, 33 women were killed, 74 were injured of varying severity,” the appeal says.

The deliberate targeting of the civilian population of Azerbaijan by Armenia, the presence of women and children among the victims of terrorist acts is another manifestation of the vandalism committed by Armenia throughout history, the appeal said.

Despite the announcement of a ceasefire between the parties from 12:00 (GMT+4) on October 10, 2020, for humanitarian reasons, at about 02:00 am (GMT+4) on October 11, the Armenian Armed Forces fired from heavy artillery and tactical ballistic missile launchers at a densely populated central quarter of the city of Ganja, located far from zones of hostilities. Armenia did not stop there, and on the night of October 17, 2020, it launched another ballistic missile at Ganja, the second largest city in Azerbaijan. In both cases, the shelling resulted in numerous casualties. At about 13:00 on October 28, 2020, the Armenian Armed Forces again violated the ceasefire declared for humanitarian reasons and fired at the center of the Barda district from the Smerch multiple missile launchers. Hundreds of civilians were injured, and many civilians were brutally killed. But Armenia, not limited by this, continued to bombard Mingachevir, Tartar, Aghdam, Shamkir, Naftalan, Aghjabadi, Khizi, Fuzuli, Jabrayil, Beylagan and other settlements of Azerbaijan using ballistic missiles and heavy artillery. In addition to the fact that the explosions of missiles and shells, artillery shelling, especially the fact that these attacks were carried out at night, led to large human casualties, this also caused psychological tension and anxiety among the civilian population, and especially among children, which shall remain with them throughout their lives.

During the period of military aggression, Armenia took targeted measures to prevent the possibility of the return of Azerbaijani internally displaced persons to their homes and lands. During this period, more than 900 settlements, 150,000 houses, 1,100 educational institutions, and 520 medical institutions were plundered in the territories of Azerbaijan, which at that time were under Armenian occupation, and the Azerbaijani territories were subjected to large-scale mining. However, the Azerbaijani state, despite all these difficulties, has entered a new stage, which includes post-conflict reconstruction and reintegration, and is moving decisively forward.

“The aggressive actions of the Armenian state during the war were not limited to the above. Seeing the defeat of its army in the combat zone, the Armenian leadership, ignoring the ‘Convention on the Rights of the Child’, the Optional Protocol on the involvement of children in armed conflicts, which it had ratified, attracted children under the age of 15 to the hostilities. Noting that the aforementioned actions of Armenia, attacks on objects protected in accordance with international law, including schools and hospitals, as well as conscription or mobilization of persons under 15 years of age to participate in hostilities are classified as war crimes, we call on all international organizations not to remain indifferent to the illegal actions of Armenia, to give a due legal assessment of its actions, contrary to the norms and principles of international law, to support the development and life of children in conditions of peace and prosperity," the appeal says.

 


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