Baku, Azerbaijan, Dec. 13
By Elchin Mehdiyev – Trend:
Azerbaijan still faces the problem of Armenian plagiarism and piracy, Kamran Imanov, chairman of the Azerbaijani Copyright Agency, said.
Imanov made the remarks at the international conference in Baku Dec. 13 dedicated to the issues of copyright and the fight against piracy and counterfeit products.
“These attempts are clearly based on political interests,” Imanov said. “Today the issue of protecting the tangible and intangible heritage acquires political and legal character.
“The Armenians’ purposeful attempts of misappropriating ancient monuments, folklore, folk music, cuisine, carpets, dance, musical instruments of neighboring peoples, in particular Azerbaijanis, do not testify to the “intercultural integration process”,” he said.
“The goal is to misappropriate tangible and intangible cultural heritage, folklore, traditional knowledge belonging to Azerbaijan, collect falsified “facts” that Hays are allegedly “autochthonous”, “inhabitants with the most ancient roots” of the South Caucasus region, the realize the illusion of “the great culture of Hay”, ”Great Armenia", and create false opinion among the international community,” Imanov added.
The chairman also said that the roots of Armenian plagiarism are closely connected with territorial claims.
“Armenians have their eye on other countries’ lands and aim at keeping Azerbaijani territories under occupation," he said. “Along with the misappropriation of Azerbaijani folklore and traditional knowledge, the Armenians are inclined to another kind of folklore, namely, myth-making, which is a kind of ‘national talent’. It is necessary to put an end to the “Armenian-Hay tradition of misappropriating Azerbaijani cultural traditions” and its modern recurrence.”