"Gardman-Shirvan-Nakhijevan" condemns statement by Azerbaijan's Aliyev

YEREVAN, MAY 29, ARMENPRESS. Gardman-Shirvan-Nakhijevan Pan-Armenian Union has strongly condemned the latest unbalanced statement made by the President of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, as part of the implementation of the illegal policy of unilateral settlement in Nagorno-Karabakh, in which he accuses Armenia of war crimes and demands their recognition and even an apology.

The irony is that such a demand is put forward by the president, while the state and the people he leads have committed the following acts of genocide during the last century.

• The massacre and looting of the peaceful civilian Armenian population during the Tatar-Armenian clashes over two years;
• Massacres, abductions, robbery and looting of Armenian settlements in the spring of 1918 in the vicinity of Shamkhor station and at stations along the Baku-Tbilisi railway;
• Forced deportation, massacre and looting of Armenians in Nukha (1918-1919);
• Forced deportation, massacre and looting of Armenians in Aresh (1918-1919);
• Targeted mass killings of Baku Armenians (September 15-17, 1918);
• Deliberate creation of conditions incompatible with life for Armenians who remained or returned to Baku (September-November 1918);
• Forced deportation of Nakhichevan Armenians (1918-1919);
• Deportation, massacre, looting of Gardman Armenians (1918-1920);
• The massacre of Shushi Armenians March 22-26, 1920;
• Continuous violence against the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh, 1918-1920;
• Sumgait massacres, 1988;
• Gandzak pogroms and deportations, 1988;
• Baku massacres, 1990;
• Ethnic cleansing of Northern Artsakh,1991;
• Maragha massacre, 1992;
• Gurgen Margaryan's axing in 2004
• Continuous destruction of the Armenian cultural heritage of Nakhichevan;
• Continuous destruction of the Armenian cultural heritage of Gardman;
• Complete destruction of the Armenian trace of Shirvan, particularly in Baku;
• Outbreak of the four-day war in 2016;
• Outbreak of the 44-day war in 202;
• Forcible displacement of the population from the territories that came under Azerbaijani control;
• Blockade of the Lachin corridor and creation of a humanitarian crisis (December 12, 2023);
• Outbreak of war against Nagorno-Karabakh (September 19-20, 2023);
• Ethnic cleansing of the population of Nagorno-Karabakh (September 2023);
• Destruction of the Armenian national-religious cultural environment of Nagorno-Karabakh.

This is just the most modest list of all the crimes that various Azerbaijani regimes have committed against Armenian settlements and the Armenian population over the past century. The enormous anti-Armenian policy, guided by the architects of Azerbaijan's future, is evident even to the naked eye.

The Union strongly condemns the abhorrent speeches of the President of Azerbaijan. The best legal step that the President of Azerbaijan could have taken would have been to announce that the state he leads is ready to appear before the international court for crimes against humanity and to bear the consequences of these crimes with full responsibility.