The people of Azerbaijan are solemnly commemorating March 31—the Day of Azerbaijani Genocide, AzVision.az reports citing the Western Azerbaijan Community's statement
According to the statement, the people of Western Azerbaijan who suffered from the total ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity committed by Armenia remember this day with deep sorrow.
The statement noted that the mass massacre of Azerbaijanis in Baku on March 31, 1918, is a horrific event that embodies the large-scale genocide carried out against our people in the historical Azerbaijani lands in the preceding and subsequent periods.
“As the decree signed by National Leader Heydar Aliyev on the Genocide of Azerbaijanis on March 26, 1998, reads, the genocide against Azerbaijanis was carried out for centuries, and its main goal was to destroy Azerbaijanis as an ethnic group and seize historical Azerbaijani territories.
Armenian political unions, armed groups, and later the state authorities of Armenia implemented a systematic genocide policy against Azerbaijanis based on ethnic hatred and racist ideology, carrying out mass massacres in numerous locations, forcibly expelling Azerbaijanis from their homeland, and systematically destroying their cultural heritage.
Acts of genocide against the Azerbaijani people were committed in almost all parts of historical Azerbaijani territories. In the years 1918-1920, mass massacres were carried out and ethnic cleansing was carried out against the Muslim population in Baku, Shamakhi, Guba, Karabakh, Nakhchivan, Lankaran, Iravan, Zangezur, Goycha, Daralayaz, Surmali, and other districts.
As a result of the acts of genocide, in which hundreds of thousands of Azerbaijanis were killed, Azerbaijanis, who once made up more than 80 percent of the population in the territory of Armenia, began to constitute an ethnic minority in that area by 1921. Following ethnic cleansing campaigns in 1948-53 and 1987-91, Azerbaijanis were completely expelled from there. Currently, there is not a single Azerbaijani left in Armenia," the statement says.
The statement adds that Armenia's occupation of 20 percent of Azerbaijani territories between 1991 and 1994, the numerous massacres committed there, the expulsion of 800,000 Azerbaijanis, and the destruction of Azerbaijani cultural heritage were part of the genocide policy.
"Unfortunately, instead of acknowledging its responsibility and taking necessary steps for peace, justice, and reconciliation, Armenia continues to pursue a policy that promotes ethnic hatred and racism, taking actions contrary to peace. Individuals who committed crimes against humanity and acts of terrorism, such as Garegin Njde, Andranik Ozanyan, Drastamat Kanayan, and Monte Melkonyan, are glorified, and the Nazi ideology of Njdeism is propagated at the state level.
It’s particularly regrettable that the Armenian government, instead of assisting the ongoing judicial process in Azerbaijan regarding war crimes and crimes against humanity, is actively obstructing it and encouraging a climate of impunity.
Moreover, Armenia continues its racist policy by obstructing the right of return of the people of Western Azerbaijan and attempting to preserve the mono-ethnicity created through genocide.
We call on the Armenian state to acknowledge its responsibility for the genocide, ethnic cleansing, crimes against humanity, and war crimes it has committed and take the necessary steps for reconciliation. Armenia must create conditions for the safe and dignified return of Azerbaijanis expelled from there and restore the Azerbaijani cultural heritage it has destroyed.
Additionally, Armenia must halt its policy and practices that promote hatred and discrimination against Azerbaijanis, hand over those who have committed crimes against humanity to justice, immediately cease glorifying them, demolish the monuments dedicated to military and political figures and terrorists who participated in crimes against Azerbaijanis, and reverse the name changes of places it carried out," the statement points out.
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