BAKU, Azerbaijan, February 23. French La Gazette online newspaper has published an article about the Khojaly genocide, committed by the Armenian armed forces 31 years ago in the Azerbaijani city in Karabakh, Trend reports.
"Every year, countries around the world remember the Khojaly tragedy, which occurred on the night of February 26, 1992, during the first Armenian-Azerbaijani Karabakh war. Armenian forces attacked the city of Khojaly in Azerbaijan, killing hundreds of civilians," the article said.
According to the authors, dozens of civilians, mostly women and children, froze to death trying to hide in the woods. Moreover, about a thousand civilians were captured during the attack.
The article noted that famous Azerbaijani journalist Chingiz Mustafayev has rushed in the city right after the attack happened, trying to capture the events, and those footages shocked the whole world. It was obvious, that those innocent civilians who were trying to escape and died on the way were the victims of this brutal massacre.
"According to the testimonies of analysts and researchers, in the four days following the Khojaly massacre, around 200 bodies were transported to Aghdam alone, while a total of 613 people were killed during the assault on the city. Among those killed were 63 children, 106 women and 70 elderly people. Others were taken prisoner, and there is still no information on the fate of 150 of them. According to accounts, citizens were taken prisoner to serve as hostages in a subsequent exchange," the article added.
As the authors rightly pointed out, those responsible for this massacre have not been held accountable for their actions yet. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan in November 2019 called the massacre a "blatant lie " that " was committed by Azerbaijanis themselves", despite the findings of Human Rights Watch that attributed direct responsibility for civilian deaths to Armenian armed forces.