Nagorno-Karabakh leader Arayik Harutiunian has issued an urgent appeal to the international community, asking for immediate action to lift a de facto blockade imposed by Azerbaijan and prevent what he called “the genocide of the people of Nagorno-Karabakh.”
“With this urgent address I am signaling that right now the people of the Republic of Artsakh [Nagorno-Karabakh – ed.] are being subjected to genocide and face a real threat of destruction and deprivation of their homeland,” Harutiunian said in a video address published late on August 8, 2023.
He then presented what he described as a humanitarian crisis created by the 240-day blockade of Nagorno-Karabakh, charging that “in a situation like this manifestation of inaction or indifference is nothing but acquiescence in the crime of genocide.”
“The international community must take effective personal and collective steps in order not to allow Azerbaijan to fill the history of mankind with another page of mass famine and genocide,” Harutiunian said.
The Karabakh leader said that Stepanakert calls on Armenia to “immediately submit to the UN Security Council for discussion the humanitarian disaster that has emerged as a result of Azerbaijan’s blockade of the Lachin Corridor and the illegal blockade of Nagorno-Karabakh, which have grown into the crime of genocide, to adopt a resolution that implies urgent and concrete steps, as well as to turn to international partners for considering and imposing sanctions against Azerbaijan.” Harutiunian also urged Yerevan to be careful in its public statements and assessments of the situation.
The president of Nagorno-Karabakh called on the UN secretary-general “to show moral and political responsibility and leadership, involving the entire UN system, to prevent further international crimes committed by Azerbaijan in Nagorno-Karabakh.”
“Please do not forget that Artsakh is currently the only territory in the world that is under complete siege and where even the international community does not have access. Don’t you have a question as to why Azerbaijan seeks to subject the peaceful people of Artsakh to complete isolation? Are you not bothered by the fact that from the point of view of human rights protection Artsakh has become not even a gray zone, but a black hole where all the crimes that human civilization has seen may happen? Do you not realize that such international impunity and allowing a new genocide will generate new crimes, possibly against your own people?! Therefore, I ask and demand from all of you that you immediately take action and stop this ongoing genocide of the people of Artsakh before it is too late,” the leader of Nagorno-Karabakh underscored.
Azerbaijan routinely brushes aside accusations that it pursues a policy of ethnic cleansings against Karabakh Armenians. After the 2020 war in which Azerbaijan regained control of all of the territories held by ethnic Armenian forces outside the borders of Nagorno-Karabakh as well as a chunk of the former autonomous oblast itself Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has repeatedly warned the local population to integrate into Azerbaijan or leave.
Tensions around the region escalated after Azerbaijan in June suspended traffic through a checkpoint it had installed in the Lachin corridor two months earlier pending an investigation after it said “various types of contraband” had been discovered in the Red Cross vehicles coming from Armenia.
Baku says it can only allow supplies to reach Nagorno-Karabakh over a road from Agdam, a town controlled by Azerbaijan in the east of the region.
Ethnic Armenian authorities in Nagorno-Karabakh reject this offer, saying Azerbaijan’s blockade is a violation of the Moscow-brokered 2020 cease-fire agreement that placed the 5-kilometer-wide strip of land under the control of Russian peacekeepers.
The United States and the European Union have urged Azerbaijan to allow humanitarian supplies to reach Nagorno-Karabakh via the Lachin corridor.
A delegation led by staff members of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee on August 8 visited the site in Armenia’s southern Syunik Province where a 19-truck convoy with humanitarian aid heading from Armenia to Nagorno-Karabakh has been stranded, awaiting approval from Azerbaijan to proceed.
A group of UN experts stated on August 7, 2023, expressing alarm over the ongoing blockade of the Lachin corridor by Azerbaijan, which they said had led to a dire humanitarian crisis in Nagorno-Karabakh. They urged Azerbaijan to lift the blockade.
“By lifting the blockade, the authorities can alleviate the suffering of thousands of people in Nagorno-Karabakh and allow for the unimpeded flow of humanitarian assistance to the civilian population. It is essential to ensure the safety, dignity, and well-being of all individuals during this critical time,” the experts said, also calling on Russian peacekeeping forces deployed in the region to protect the corridor under the terms of the ceasefire agreement.
Azerbaijan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs criticized the UN experts for what it described as their biased statement that it claimed had been influenced by “Armenia’s manipulations.”
azatutyun.am
