Details added: first version posted on 11:00
BAKU, Azerbaijan, Sept. 23
Trend:
The illegal settlement of Syrian and Lebanese Armenians in occupied Nagorno Karabakh raises concerns, Chairperson of Azerbaijani parliament Sahiba Gafarova said.
Gafarova made the statement during her speech at the plenary session of Federation Council of Russia's Federal Assembly on Sept. 23, Trend reports.
"I cannot but touch upon the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, which is the most painful problems of Azerbaijan. A fifth of the Azerbaijani territories - the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts are occupied by Armenia,” the chairperson said.
“I would like to give a brief outline of the history of Nagorno Karabakh, so that they would have a complete and objective idea of the conflict. On May 14, 1805, in Azerbaijan, in the village of Kurekchay near Ganja, the Kurekchay Treaty was signed on the transfer of the Karabakh Khanate to the Russian Empire,” she reminded. “The agreement was signed by the Karabakh Khanate’s ruler Ibrahim Khalil Khan and the General of the Russian Empire Pavel Tsitsianov."
“In 1921, the Caucasian Bureau of the Bolshevik Party made the decision to preserve Nagorno Karabakh within Azerbaijan. Pay attention - not "to transfer", as some falsified Armenian sources unreasonably assert, but "to preserve". In 1923, the Azerbaijan SSR adopted a decree on the establishment of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Region within Azerbaijan," Gafarova said.
The chairperson also reminded that Armenia has never stopped trying to capture Nagorno Karabakh and that the last time this took place in the 1980s.
“During that period, hundreds of thousands of Azerbaijanis, who had lived on their historical lands for centuries, were expelled from Armenia, and 700,000 Azerbaijanis were expelled from their permanent places of residence in Nagorno Karabakh and seven surrounding districts of Azerbaijan,” she noted. “As a result of ethnic cleansing among the civilian population, there were numerous casualties, and despite modern international humanitarian law, the demographic situation in the occupied territories has been illegally changed."
Gafarova touched upon the destructive position of Armenia on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and the provocation committed by this country on the border with the Tovuz district of Azerbaijan.
"Despite the highest-level adoption of four UN Security Council resolutions on the immediate and unconditional withdrawal Armenian armed formations from the occupied territories of Azerbaijan in 1993, the Armenian side, constantly violating the ceasefire regime, still ignores these resolutions,” she stressed. “The last provocation was committed by Armenia not in Karabakh, but on the Azerbaijani-Armenian state border.”
“So, on July 12 this year, settlements in the direction of the Azerbaijani Tovuz district were shelled from artillery installations. As a result, Azerbaijani servicemen and civilians were wounded and killed. All these facts are a gross violation of international humanitarian law, including the Geneva Convention of August 12, 1949 and its Additional Protocol, adopted on June 8, 1977, and are regarded as a war crime,” the chairperson pointed out.