The post HRW: Armenia’s Unlawful Rocket, Missile Strikes on Azerbaijan appeared first on Karabakh.org.
]]>Armenian military forces carried out unlawfully indiscriminate rocket and missile strikes on Azerbaijan during the hostilities from September to November 2020, Human Rights Watch said today.
During on-site investigations in Azerbaijan in November, Human Rights Watch documented 11 incidents in which Armenian forces used ballistic missiles, unguided artillery rockets, and large-caliber artillery projectiles that hit populated areas in apparent indiscriminate attacks. In at least four other cases, munitions struck civilians or civilian objects in areas where there were no apparent military targets.
“Armenian forces repeatedly launched missiles, unguided rockets, and heavy artillery into populated cities and villages in violation of the laws of war,” said Hugh Williamson, Europe and Central Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “Again and again in the course of the six-week war, these attacks unlawfully destroyed civilian lives and homes and should be impartially investigated.”
Fighting between Azerbaijan and Armenia escalated on September 27 and continued until November 10, when the prime minister of Armenia and presidents of Azerbaijan and Russia concluded an agreement to end the hostilities.
Human Rights Watch investigated missile, rocket, and artillery attacks by Armenian forces that struck cities, towns, and villages in Aghdam, Barda, Fizuli, Ganja, Goranboy, Naftalan, and Tartar in Azerbaijan. This report examines 18 of these strikes, which killed 40 civilians and wounded dozens more, based on in-person interviews with 53 witnesses to attacks and 12 phone interviews, news reports, and governmental data. Human Rights Watch could not determine the lawfulness of three of the 18 attacks.
Human Rights Watch also examined satellite imagery of 10 of the 17 attacks and photos and videos posted on social media from the site of nine of the attacks, which corroborated the time and date of the attacks, and the scale of destruction. Other attacks will be addressed in future reports.
Satellite imagery revealed that Azerbaijan military forces were present in the cities of Ganja and Tartar and the villages of Gashalti and Tapgaragoyunlu, which Armenian forces attacked. Azerbaijan unnecessarily put civilians at risk by locating military objectives within or near densely populated areas and failing to remove civilians from the vicinity of military activities, Human Rights Watch said. However, the presence of military objectives did not permit Armenia to use inherently inaccurate explosive weapons with a large destructive radius in populated areas.
The governmental Azerbaijan National Agency for Mine Action (ANAMA) found that unguided Smerch artillery rockets and Scud-B ballistic missiles were used in attacks on Ganja between October 4 and 17, killing 32 civilians. Scud-B missiles, which can carry a 985-kilogram, high-explosive warhead, can miss their intended target by at least 500 meters. Attacks using weapons that cannot be directed at a specific military objective and so do not distinguish military targets from civilians and civilian objects, are indiscriminate, violating the laws of war.
In addition to causing civilian casualties, the Armenian attacks damaged homes, businesses, schools, and a health clinic, and contributed to mass displacement. According to the Azerbaijani prosecutor general’s office, 98 civilians were killed and 414 wounded during the armed conflict, and over 3,000 homes and 100 apartment buildings were destroyed or damaged. Azerbaijani government officials told Human Rights Watch that fighting displaced 40,000 people. Residents from conflict-affected areas that Human Rights Watch visited said that many people, especially women and children, had fled to safer areas.
The laws of war require attackers to issue effective warnings of attacks affecting civilians unless circumstances do not permit. Witnesses to attacks said they were not aware of warnings from Armenian or local Nagorno-Karabakh forces. On October 4, Arayik Harutyunyan, the Nagorno-Karabakh president, issued tweets in English calling on civilians “to avoid inevitable loss” by leaving “large cities,” including Ganja, where military forces would be attacked. Threats of attacks on unspecified targets over an unspecified period, in a language few Azerbaijani civilians can read, were not effective warnings.
Human Rights Watch previously reported Armenian attacks on Barda on October 28 that killed 21 civilians and wounded 70, and documented Azerbaijan’s use of cluster munitions in at least four incidents in Nagorno-Karabakh as of October 23.
The Armenian government should conduct impartial, thorough, and transparent investigations into attacks by Armenian forces that appear to violate international humanitarian law, or the laws of war.
States are currently in the process of negotiating a political declaration that would commit them to refrain from using explosive weapons in populated areas. Azerbaijan and Armenia should endorse such a political declaration, Human Rights Watch said.
“Armenian forces fired hugely destructive, inaccurate weapons into Azerbaijan’s cities, towns, and villages,” Williamson said. “Accountability for these and other apparent violations of the laws of war by both sides is critical if the region is ever going to move beyond this vicious, decades-long conflict.”
For details of the attacks and violations of the law of war, please see below.
On September 27, between 5 p.m. and 6 p.m., an Armenian artillery attack killed five members of the Gurbanov family, all civilians, and damaged several homes in Gashalti, Naftalan district, three witnesses said. The village has approximately 1,200 residents. The attackhit Nadir Gurbanov’s home and killed his father, Elbrus, 69, mother, Shefiyat Gurbanova, 64, wife, Afag Amirova, 39, a niece, Fidan Gurbanova, 14, and his son Shariyar, 13. His one surviving son is attending secondary school in Baku.
Nadir, 41, a military serviceman, was stationed with his regiment about three kilometers away. “I saw one shell land near my house, and another shell a minute or two later, so I rushed home to check,” he said.
Nadir’s cousin, Mohammad Mammadov, said he arrived at the house to see Nadir hugging pieces of children’s bodies. “It was impossible to recognize them,” he said. “They were charred and had been hurled in every direction by the blast.” Human Rights Watch examined the severely damaged house and found several munition remnants in the courtyard that were consistent with fragments of large-caliber artillery.
Nadir’s brother Nijat, 44, said that at the time of the attack, Nadir’s regiment was the military objective closest to the village. However, satellite imagery indicates a large area where military forces may have been deployed that extends from the southern boundary of Gashalti and along the eastern side of the road leading to Tapgaragoyunlu, six kilometers south.
Satellite imagery recorded on October 8 shows significant military activity in this area, including recently constructed trenches, fighting positions, earthen berms, tactical deployments, and the movement of military vehicles coming from the direction of the front line, just south of Tapgaragoyunlu, toward Gashalti.
Human Rights Watch was unable to determine the intended target. However, the use of large caliber artillery, which due to its inaccuracy is typically fired multiple times and produces blast and fragments over wide areas, renders an attack indiscriminate in populated areas.
Armenian forces conducted attacks using ballistic missiles and rocket artillery that hit residential neighborhoods in Ganja, Azerbaijan’s second-most populous city, on October 4, 11, and 17, killing 32 civilians and injuring dozens more. In addition, rocket artillery attacks hitting Ganja’s Grand Bazar shopping mall on October 5, reportedly wounded three people who were hospitalized, and School Number 4 on October 8, which did not cause civilian casualties. These explosive weapons, which are inaccurate and have wide-area effects, are indiscriminate in populated areas.
Azerbaijani forces created military sites in Ganja without moving the population to safer areas, putting civilians at unnecessary risk. Satellite imagery revealed long-term military sites in the city and forces in populated areas in at least two cases close to the time of attacks. Satellite imagery also showed a large area abutting populated areas in southeastern Ganja with increased military vehicular activity in October. The edge of the military position is 270 meters from the site of a ballistic missile strike on October 17 on Suleyman Rustem primary road.
In an October 17 statement following two ballistic missile attacks early that day, the Nagorno-Karabakh Defense Army listed seven sites in Ganja that it said were military targets, without providing location specifics.
Ganja residents showed Human Rights Watch one of the listed locations, the Armed Forces General Staff Radio Technical Battalion, which they said had been closed before the latest hostilities. It is a few hundred meters from the areas Armenian forces attacked on October 4. Human Rights Watch was not able to verify whether the site was in operation at the time of the attack; it was not in operation during a visit on November 7.
Another listed site, an air force helicopter squadron base, is at the Ganja International Airport, 4.5 kilometers from the closest attack on October 17. While Nagorno-Karabakh local authorities announced they had destroyed Ganja’s “military airport” following attacks on October 4, Ganja International Airport is the only airport in the area, seven kilometers from the closest site attacked on October 4, and was not harmed in the fighting on either October 4 or 17.
Asked in a BBC interview why Armenian forces had attacked civilians in Ganja, Armenia’s then-foreign minister, Zohrab Mnatsakanyan, skirted the issue and instead cited deadly attacks by Azerbaijani forces on civilians in Stepanakert, Nagorno-Karabakh’s capital.
Attacks that use weapons that cannot distinguish between civilians and civilian objects and military targets, or that treat a number of separate and distinct military objectives in a city as a single military objective are indiscriminate.
October 4
At around 10:30 to 11 a.m. on October 4, Armenian forces launched three rockets that hit within a few hundred meters of one another in residential neighborhoods in Ganja, witnesses said. Human Rights Watch visited the three areas on November 7 and interviewed nine witnesses after speaking with three witnesses by phone in October. Human Rights Watch documented injuries to 18 civilians in these strikes.
Official Azerbaijani sources said the attacks killed one civilian, Tunar Aliyev, and wounded 32. On the basis of weapons’ remnants, and consistent with damage that Human Rights Watch observed and witness descriptions of the attack, ANAMA identified the attack as a barrage of Smerch rockets, which are indiscriminate weapons that should not be used in populated areas.
On Ali Nazmi Street, Human Rights Watch observed two destroyed residential buildings, one of them a multi-family structure, and about 30 damaged houses, and spoke to two residents who witnessed the attack. Taleh Asgarov said that flying glass and other debris injured six of his family members. His home and his brother’s house next door were severely damaged. Besti Khalilova, a pensioner, said in a phone interview that she, her son, daughter-in-law, and 1-year-old granddaughter were wounded. She shared by phone a photograph of her granddaughter’s head wound.
A second attack hit on Aziz Aliyev Avenue, where Human Rights Watch observed severely damaged homes and spoke to four witnesses. Gunduz Piira Tural, 31, said the attack destroyed his home, wounded his children and his mother-in-law, and left his wife, 26, unable to see. Gunash Kasimova, 66, said she heard a huge blast and ran into the street, saw that a house had caught fire, and helped drag a 4-year-old girl, Sara, and a baby, out of the house. Sara’s aunt, Seven Amirova, confirmed Kasimova’s account. Rahila Zargarova, 62, said she was having tea when she “heard a huge blast, and the ceiling and roof fell on [her] head.” Her head injury was visible when researchers interviewed her in November.
Armenian forces conducted a third strike that caused damage to a residential area on Nariman Narimanov Avenue. There, Human Rights Watch observed the destroyed home of Abbas Hasanov and his wife, Lala Hasanova, 31, and a crater in their backyard, and spoke to them and Hasanova’s father, Arif Aliyev, who was there during the attack. She said she and her two young children were injured. She heard two explosions and went to turn on the television news when a blast threw her into the living room, sent her daughter into another room, and covered her and her son in debris. She and her daughter suffered bruises and cuts and her son had broken arms and fingers, the family said.
October 11
At about 1:50 a.m. on October 11, Armenian forces fired a Scud-B ballistic missile that detonated in a residential neighborhood between Ganja’s parallel streets of Alakbar bay Rafibayli and H. Aliyev Avenue, killing 10 civilians and wounding 34 others, according to residents and official sources. Human Rights Watch observed a massive crater and more than 20 damaged or destroyed buildings in the area, behind a row of multi-story commercial buildings facing Aliyev Avenue, close to a small park.
Two witnesses, Akifa Bayramova, 63, and Shargiya Dashdamirova, 68, interviewed separately, said the explosion buried them and that they had to be pulled out of the rubble. Bayramova estimated that at least 60 families had lived in the buildings that were damaged or destroyed. Dashdamirova said she was still “covered in bruises” and had difficulty walking 10 days after the attack, when Human Rights Watch spoke to her. Her home was completely destroyed.
Saadat Alasgarova, 43, said the attack killed her brother-in-law, his wife, and their son, destroyed their two-story home, and killed seven other people.
ANAMA said that it recovered remnants of a Scud-B ballistic missile at the site. Based on images of the remnants tweeted by an Azerbaijan government official, an independent weapons analyst also identified it as a Scud-B.
Human Rights Watch analysis of satellite imagery taken between October 9 and 16 identified military weapons and equipment at sites 700 meters and one kilometer from the impact crater of the October 11 attack on Ganja; neither military site was damaged. Satellite imagery showed a third site, 200 meters from the October 11 attack, that contained transport vehicles. Human Rights Watch was not able to verify whether the site or the vehicles observed there were used to support military operations.
October 17
At about 1 a.m. on October 17, ballistic missiles hit two residential neighborhoods in Ganja, killing 21 civilians, including five who had died of their wounds after the attack as of November 6, according to residents and official sources.
One missile, which ANAMA identified as a Scud-B, hit the residential Mukhtar Hajiev Street. Human Rights Watch interviewed 13 residents who were at home at the time of attack, and observed 10 houses destroyed and over 20 damaged at the site. Shaira Guliyeva, 47, whose home was next to the impact crater said:
We found our neighbor’s leg in what used to be our kitchen. [Someone’s] intestines were found on a telephone wire. Two children were killed in a neighboring house – their bedroom was completely destroyed, so the family could not even recover the bodies.
Guliyeva said that her nephew, Arthur Guliyev, 13, had to be dug out after the attack and died a week later and that her sister, Gulnara, was seriously injured and remained in the hospital as of November 6. She said that flying debris also injured her and her mother.
Fakhriya Aliyeva, 20, whose house was destroyed, said her neighbors Zuleiha Shakhnazarova and Royal Shakhnazarov and their 16-month-old daughter Madina Shakhnazarli were killed, leaving their 3-year-old daughter in her grandparents’ care. Aliyeva said Madina’s “body was found under the debris of their house and her mother’s [severed] head was found in the courtyard.”
Timur Sarkarov said the explosion destroyed his father’s home, killing his father, sister, brother, and two nieces and leaving three survivors wounded and traumatized, including another brother, who lost his hearing.
Ramiz Gahramanov was home when the strike killed his daughter, daughter-in-law, and two grandsons, ages 6 and 11, and destroyed his two-story home. After the attack, he said he had to identify his family from pieces of their hair and body parts.
Mahir Bagirov, 55 and Bahar Bagirova, 53, had lived at their house with their daughter Ilaha Hamzayeva and her three children, ages 9, 7, and 2, when it was destroyed in the attack. Hamzayeva, 29, said that each night since the attack, she “cannot stop shaking” and her toddler “barely eats anything… [and] keeps saying ‘Mama, bomb.’”
Almost simultaneously with the attack on Mukhtar Hajiev Street, a second Scud-B missile hit the Avtozavod neighborhood on Suleyman Rustem primary road. The attack destroyed or left uninhabitable 15 family homes and damaged 40 to 50 others, residents said. Human Rights Watch observed a large crater and dozens of damaged or destroyed residential buildings and munition remnants scattered at the blast site on November 7, and other missile remnants at the ANAMA headquarters in Baku on November 4.
Human Rights Watch interviewed nine Avtozavod neighborhood residents, including Farhad Heydarov, 64, who showed his house with destroyed doors, windows, and roof and pointed out a building where he said a woman named Maral and her granddaughter were killed. Basti Jafarova, 62, said she was treated in the same hospital room where Maral died.
Jafarova’s 10 family members suffered cuts after the blast, which tore off their roof. Two members of the extended Mammadov family said that the explosion destroyed three homes where they and nine other family members lived, and killed two relatives, Elman Mammadov, 52, and his sister-in-law Aybaniz Mammadova, 40. Azad Jafarov, 30, said the explosion destroyed her house and embedded pieces of a plastic window frame in her body, causing “horrible pain.”
Satellite imagery showed a large area of military deployment with increased military vehicular activity during October that abuts residential areas in southeastern Ganja. The edge of the military site is 270 meters from the ballistic missile strike on Suleyman Rustem primary road.
Tartar City
Azerbaijan maintained a significant military presence in or near parts of the city of Tartar. Armenian forces frequently shelled the city throughout the conflict.
On September 28, the second day of fighting, a fragment of a shell that struck the main street in front of the Tartar District Court hit an ambulance and cut off the leg of the driver, Ganbar Asadov, 52. Another shell killed Mehman Aliyev, a 45-year-old civilian on the sidewalk about 20 meters from the courthouse. On November 8, Human Rights Watch observed damage to the area consistent with artillery shelling.
Satellite images show that new fighting positions, trenches, and military equipment were established after September 27, surrounding the southern and western parts of Tartar city.
During October, new tactical deployments emerged immediately adjacent to residential areas in Tartar and nearby towns. From October 8 to 23, the number of Azerbaijani artillery rocket launchers located near Tartar city increased from one to four.
Satellite imagery recorded on October 23 showed substantial damage and cratering from shelling throughout Tartar city during October. Hundreds of craters consistent with heavy artillery shelling were concentrated in the Shikharkh neighborhood, on the city’s western edge, comprised of multi-story residential buildings for people displaced by fighting in the 1990s. Specific satellite imagery of Shikharkh recorded on October 3 shows signs of an artillery attack, and a video uploaded to social media by a local resident on October 2, which Human Rights Watch viewed, shows an artillery attack on a kindergarten in the settlement that day.
While in Tartar city on November 8, Human Rights Watch observed severely damaged houses and shops on the main street, as well as numerous military vehicles
October 15 Attack on Tartar City Cemetery
At around 12:45 p.m. on October 15, an Armenian forces strike hit a cemetery 400 meters north of Tartar, killing four civilians attending a funeral, Parviz Orujov, 31, Shakir Zamanov, 32, Vasif Rustamov, 60, and Iskandar Amirov, 53, witnesses said. Four men were injured.
Fizuli Mammadov, 54, who was wounded in the attack, said in a phone interview that they had gone to the cemetery to bury his aunt, who died of natural causes. He said that they were carrying her body to the cemetery entrance when they heard whistling overhead. They dropped the body to run for cover when a munition exploded about 50 meters away, and a few minutes later, another munition hit a grave nearby. Mammadov said he was injured in his back, leg, and left arm, which required surgery.
Rafael Gazanfarli, 34, a mullah who came from Goranboy for the burial, said in a phone interview that he was wounded in both legs and one of his kidneys by 11 fragments.
The witnesses said they did not observe any military targets in the vicinity of the cemetery at the time of the attack. Human Rights Watch visited the cemetery on November 8 and examined the damaged graves.
October 28 Attack on Barda City
An Armenian strike hit Barda City at about 1:30 p.m. on October 28. Dr. Vusal Mammadov, 40, the director and chief surgeon of the Barda Treatment and Diagnostic Center, said he was working at the center when “everything turned dirt, dust, and soil, and [we] lost all the windows.” A fragment from a second explosion wounded a nurse, Ramziya Guliyeva, leaving her unable to move her legs and damaged dialysis machines, and shattered glass cut 22 patients and staff, Mammadov said.
Human Rights Watch observed damage to the clinic, severe damage to a State Migration Service office, and to the windows and concrete perimeter wall of a sports complex, consistent with an explosive weapon with wide area effects. Clinic staff showed Human Rights Watch researchers on November 9 remnants of unguided Smerch rockets that produce blast and fragmentation effects, which they said they had collected from the clinic’s grounds from the attack. The attack was apparently part of the Smerch rocket barrage at 1:30 p.m. on October 28, which Human Rights Watch previously documented, that killed 21 civilians and wounded 70, with cluster munitions and parachute-retarded high-explosive fragmentation rocket.
On October 29, the local Nagorno Karabakh Defense Army listed six sites in Barda as military targets, without providing locations.
November 7 Attack in Ayrija Village
On November 7, Armenian forces fired a rocket that struck an agricultural field near the village of Ayrija, Shahmaly Rahimov, 16, as he was playing with other children. No other children were wounded. ANAMA identified the munition as a 9M528 Smerch rocket, which carries a warhead that produces blast and fragmentation effect.
Human Rights Watch visited the site and the place where Shahmaly’s relatives said he was killed, nearly 100 meters from the impact site. His uncles, Isa Rahimov, 65, and Gulmaly Rahimov, 58, said that no one else was wounded and that it was the only attack on Ayrija. When Human Rights Watch visited the small rural settlement two days after the strike, researchers did not observe any military objectives in the area.
Even if there was a valid military target, attacks that use weapons that cannot distinguish between civilians and civilian structures and military targets are unlawfully indiscriminate.
October 28 Attack in Tapgaragoyunlu Village
An artillery attack on October 4 at about 3:30 p.m. wounded Gumush Garayeva, 52. “Suddenly a wave lifted me and threw me against the wall,” she said. “A cloud of dust and smoke filled the room. I could not see anything. My left leg was bleeding.”
At about 5 p.m. on October 28, Armenian forces fired a munition that produced fragmentation and killed Flora Zahidova, 63, a civilian, while she was home alone, said Abbas Alaverdiyev, a village representative. Alaverdiyev said he found her body, with a severe head wound and a broken leg, in the covered courtyard behind her house. Human Rights Watch on November 9 observed substantial damage consistent with fragmentation at Zahidova’s home. The village, with 650 households, had 170 homes with various degrees of damage due to attacks, Alaverdiyev said.
While in Tapgaragoyunlu, Human Rights Watch observed a significant Azerbaijani military presence, including a large military base and numerous military trucks. Human Rights Watch could not determine the legality of the two attacks investigated.
Armenian forces struck Hajimammadli village, in an agricultural area, at around 11 a.m. on October 1, residents and local news reports said. Two civilians, Murshud Mammadov, 54, and his son Samir Mammadov, 24, were killed in the courtyard of their home. Murshud’s cousin Ahliyat Mammadov, 42, said that Murshud’s wife, two other children, and his father had been staying elsewhere during the hostilities.
“It was just the two of them there,” Ahliyat Mammadov said. “I was in the bomb shelter nearby. And I ran to the location five minutes after the explosion and found the bodies.” He said it was the only attack on the village. The general prosecutor’s office said that the attack involved large-caliber artillery shelling.
Human Rights Watch found no evident military objectives when visiting the strike site on November 10.
At about 1:45 a.m. on October 5, Armenian forces fired a munition that landed in a field about 500 meters from Babi, residents said. The village, with roughly 1,200 residents, is about five kilometers from the city of Horadiz, in Fuzili district.
Asuda Aliyeva, who was home with her husband and 8-year-old son, said: “We woke up from the loud noise. The electricity was out. The door, windows, and ceiling fell where we were sleeping. I don’t know how to describe it. We were so scared.”
Human Rights Watch, which visited the site on November 10, observed small remnants of a munition at the site of the crater. ANAMA identified the munition as a Scud-B ballistic missile and measured the crater as 15 meters in diameter.
An ANAMA official reported that at the time of the attack the nearest Azerbaijani military unit was seven kilometers away, in Cocuk Merjanli in the Jabrayil region. Human Rights Watch could not determine the intended target of the attack.
Relevant International Humanitarian Law Standards
International humanitarian law, or the laws of war, applicable to the international armed conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia, prohibits deliberate attacks on civilians or attacks that are indiscriminate or cause disproportionate harm to civilians and civilian objects. Warring parties must take all feasible precautions to avoid or minimize civilian harm, including by refraining from deploying in densely populated areas.
Indiscriminate attacks strike military objectives and civilians or civilian objects without distinction. These include attacks that are not directed at a specific military objective or that use weapons that cannot be so directed. Prohibited indiscriminate attacks include area bombardment, attacks by artillery, or other means that treat as a single military objective a number of clearly separated and distinct military objectives in an area containing a concentration of civilians and civilian objects.
Military commanders must choose a means of attack that can be directed at military targets and will minimize incidental harm to civilians. If the weapons used are so inaccurate that they cannot be directed at military targets without imposing a substantial risk of civilian harm, then they should not be deployed.
While there is no general prohibition against the use of explosive weapons in populated areas, the use of weapons that are inherently indiscriminate, such as cluster munitions or unguided rockets, may invariably cause indiscriminate harm to civilians and civilian objects. Warring parties should avoid the use of explosive weapons with wide-area effects in populated areas due to the foreseeable civilian harm they cause, both at the time of attack and in the future, Human Rights Watch said.
Serious violations of the laws of war committed by individuals with criminal intent, deliberately or recklessly, are war crimes. Governments have a duty to investigate allegations of war crimes by members of their armed forces or forces on their territory and to fairly prosecute those found responsible.
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]]>BBC report from Ganja where the death toll has risen to 10 after the first missile:
Our report from #Ganja (on Sunday) after an attack on #Azerbaijan‘s second largest city. The death toll has now risen to 10. Baku accused Armenia of a war crime. Yerevan accused Azerbaijan of shelling civilians. With @Goktay and @Zeynep_erdim. pic.twitter.com/ggMlnYkmje
— Orla Guerin (@OrlaGuerin) October 13, 2020
BBC: Three-year-old Hadija is now an orphan. Her mum, dad and older sister were killed in a missile strike by Armenian forces on their house.
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]]>The post History of Karabakh appeared first on Karabakh.org.
]]>
Karabakh region was the most ancient place of stay of the human being in the territory of the former Soviet Union. Uzerliktapa
In I Millennium BC such tribes, as Gargars, Utis, Saks, Sodes, which along with other tribes constituted the Albanian tribe union, lived
Beginning from II c. BC Armenian state that emerged in Upper Euphrates carried out invasive wars against the neighboring countries. Western regions
Christianity that was utilized as an instrumental for strengthening the power of the Albanian kings and for struggle against the supremacy of
Spread of Islam among Albanians and imposition of the authority of the Armenian church over the Christian Albanians, which took place after
At the end of the 9th – beginning of the 10th century, the Albanian ethnic self-conscience revived and materialized in the creation
At the end of XV c. the Azerbaijanian State of Ak-Koyunlu was lacerated with its internal contradictions. By 1500 it disintegrated into
Emergence of a powerful Safavid State in the eastern borders of the Ottoman Empire, naturally, worried the latter a lot. Besides clash
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]]>“Nowhere to hide for Azeri refugees. A new exodus of refugees is under way as Armenian forces continue ignoring United Nations demands that they stop their offensive. UN officials say at least 10,000 [Azeris] have been killed.”
“Fleeing Azeris in trek ordeal – ragged, starving and frozen after a hazardous trek across snowbound mountains…they arrive at a rate of 900 a day after a 50 mile journey, fleeing an Armenian offensive in the west of Azerbaijan”
“US Rebukes Armenia on New Drive in Caucasus – for seizing territory of neighboring Azerbaijan. Secretary of State called on Yerevan to withdraw its forces immediately. Protest marked first time US publicly criticized one side in the conflict”
“Brutal turn is seen for the Armenian forces”.
“What we see now is a systematic destruction of every village in [Armenian military’s] way,” said one senior US [State Department] official. “It’s one of the most disgusting things we’ve seen. It’s vandalism.”
“40,000 [Azeris] flee Armenian tank offensive – Yerevan’s military strategy leads to an ‘annexation’ of neighbouring Azeri territory. [There is] no doubt about the impact of Armenia’s latest land-grab that left it in control of nearly 1/10 of Azerbaijan.”
“Turkey and Russia united on Armenia…condemning [the] invasion of Azerbaijan. Russia changed its attitude this summer when Armenians from Karabakh started pushing beyond the enclave, taking 20% of [Azerbaijan’s] territory and creating a refugee crisis.”
“Azeri refugees pray for peace and head home – brave few returning to villages pray that Armenians are ready for peace after five years of war in which 15,000 people have died. UN believes 800k-1mm Azeris have been driven from their homes”
“Armenian offensive dashes Azeri peace hopes – hundreds of children drown while fleeing latest [Armenian] attacks, while swimming to safety across the Aras river. In Azeri towns and villages everything was on fire…”
“Armenian troops pushing deeper into Azerbaijan burned a string of villages and captured [Zangilan], forcing tens of thousands across Aras river into Iran. Latest offensive brings the number of Azeris chased from their homes to 300,000”
“Karabakh conflict puts thousands of Azeri refugees on a road to nowhere – 60,000 people live in tents, railway wagons and other shelters. Their plight is the most pitiful of the 1 million Azeris who lost their homes”
“Azeris square up to a loser’s peace – the extension of ceasefire leaves 20% of Azerbaijan under Armenian occupation and 1 millions Azeris displaced. They have nothing to console them but memories of defeat, lost homes, and dead relatives”
Source: @karabaghtruths
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]]>“Refugees and fresh graves confirm massacre by Armenians – Azeris hunted down and shot in the forest.”
“Evidence of a Massacre Emerges in Azerbaijan – New evidence emerged yesterday of a massacre of civilians by Armenian militants in Nagorno Karabakh.”
“…they were men, women & children of Khojaly, an Azerbaijani village in the war torn enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh overrun by Armenian forces on Feb 25-26. Many were killed at close range..some had their faces mutilated, others were scalped.”
“Corpses scattered over killing fields of Nagorno-Karabakh – stiffened by death and cold, the mutilated corpses of Azeris mown down as they fled an Armenian offensive in Nagorno-Karabakh”
“Something grim happened in Khojaly. Explanation by attacking Armenians, who insist no innocents were deliberately killed, is hardly convincing. Videotapes include images of disfigured civilians, some scalped, others shot through head. Armenians claim footage is fake.”
“Corpses litter hills in Karabakh – as we swooped low over the snow covered hills of Nagorno Karabakh we saw the scattered corpses”
“Karabakh survivors flee to mountains – Azerbaijani civilians fleeing Nagorno Karabakh have been wantonly killed by Armenian forces”
“Bodies mark site of Karabakh massacre.”
“Armenia chips away at last Azerbaijani bases in Karabakh – on every return to Agdam, Armenian bombardments have eroded the town a little further”
“Armenian militants massacred men, women and children after forcing them from a town in Nagorno-Karabakh last week”
“Armenians hold Azeris hostage”
“Refugees fleeing the fighting in Khojaly, a town of 6,000… up to 500 people including women and children, were killed in the attack.”
“Painful search for Khojali’s dead – the Azeris are compiling a grim inventory of massacre victims. Gruesome extent of February’s killing of Azeris by Armenians in the town of Khojali is at last emerging – 600 men, women and children dead.”
“More than 600 Azerbaijanis, most of them civilians, were killed by Armenian forces during a bloody February engagement in Nagorno Karabakh town of Khojali”
Front Page. “Relatives weep over the grave of a man who was among those killed in Khojaly, the town in Nagorno-Karabakh region that was stormed by Armenian militants last week”
“Survivors describe Armenian attack…it is clear that many people were killed in the assault, when #Armenian forces attacked the #Azerbaijani town…”
“Corpses attest to massacre by Armenians.”
“Armenian soldiers massacre hundreds of fleeing families. … shot and bayoneted more than 450 Azeris, many of them women and children, who were fleeing an attack on their town … possibly thousands missing and feared dead.”
“Last Azeri fortress falls to Armenians – with the ink barely dry on the most recent ceasefire, Armenian forces supported by tanks and helicopter gunships have overrun the last Azeri settlement, [Shusha], in Nagorno-Karabakh”
“Survivors tell of killings by Armenians in Azerbaijan enclave – An Azeri refugee from the town of Khojali in Nagorno-Karabakh tears her face in grief. Her family was killed in a slaughter [carried out by Armenian forces].”
Source: @karabaghtruths
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]]>The post Karabakh in Maps: Karabakh in Ancient Times appeared first on Karabakh.org.
]]>Historical Map of the Persian Empire about 500 B.C. Illustrating boundaries of satrapies under Darius I the Great, Royal Highway.
University of Texas at Austin. Historical Atlas by William Shepherd (1923-26).
Historical map of the Macedonian Empire during 336-323 BC. Boundaries of the satrapies formed at the partition after the death of Alexander in 323 BC.
University of Texas at Austin. Historical Atlas by William Shepherd (1911).
Historical map of the Macedonian Empire at the beginning of the struggle with Rome about 200 BC.
University of Texas at Austin. Historical Atlas by William Shepherd (1911).
Karabakh during the growth of Roman Empire in Asia Minor 280-160 BC
Historical maps of the growth of Roman power in Asia Minor. University of Texas at Austin. Historical Atlas by William Shepherd (1923-26).
History maps of the growth of Roman power in Asia Minor. University of Texas at Austin. Historical Atlas by William Shepherd (1923-26).
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]]>The post UN Security Council Meetings 1993 appeared first on Karabakh.org.
]]>#HISTORIC: @Madeleine Albright at #UN #SecurityCouncil meeting on Aug. 18, 1993, reading the Council’s statement condemning occupation of #Azerbaijan’s territories, demanding withdrawal of occupying forces & reaffirming support for #Azerbaijan’s #territorialintegrity. | #Armenia pic.twitter.com/taZO5Yzgpv
— Nasimi Aghayev ?? (@NasimiAghayev) September 23, 2020Today #Azerbaijan liberated City of #Zangilan from #Armenia’s 27-year-long occupation. In 1993, @UN #SecurityCouncil passed res. 884 condemning this occupation. I unearthed video of the resolution’s passage. Armenia ignored the res. #Azerbaijan is now implementing this document. pic.twitter.com/Vc1I17OPZX
— Nasimi Aghayev ?? (@NasimiAghayev) October 20, 2020
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]]>The post Azerbaijan raises illegality of settlement of Syrian Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh appeared first on Karabakh.org.
]]>Issue of illegality of settlement in Azerbaijan’s historical territories was also mentioned in earlier reports of the OSCE mission and Minsk Group, the ministry said.
“Nagorno-Karabakh is ready to accept Syrian Armenians, provide them an opportunity to study in Artsakh free of charge, as well as provide them with accommodation,” Prime Minister of the separatist regime of occupied Nagorno Karabakh, Ara Harutyunyan said addressing Armenian youth resting in the camp “Aspet” (Knight), Armenian media outlets reported.
The conflict between the two South Caucasus countries began in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. Armenian armed forces have occupied 20 per cent of Azerbaijan since 1992, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts.
Azerbaijan and Armenia signed a ceasefire agreement in 1994. The co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group – Russia, France and the U.S. – are currently holding peace negotiations.
Armenia has not yet implemented the U.N. Security Council’s four resolutions on the liberation of the Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding regions.
2012, Trend.az
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]]>The post A Forgotten War in Azerbaijan Goes On appeared first on Karabakh.org.
]]>6 June 2012. Photo: Mathias Depardon.
Source: WSJ
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]]>The post The Debacle: From Kafan To Khojaly appeared first on Karabakh.org.
]]>When the ethnic Azerbaijani citizens living in Kafan and Mehri districts of Armenian SSR were subject to brutal beatings and expulsion in November 1987, one could hardly imagine, the hatred towards Azerbaijanis would transform into a disturbing act of terror, culminating in Khojaly Massacre.
Foreshadowed by the public speech of Mikhail Gorbachev’s advisor Abel Aganbekyan in Paris on November 16, 1987 on annexation of Nagorno-Karabakh region of Azerbaijan SSR to Armenian SSR, the nationalist circles in Armenia started to mobilize their efforts on the Republic Square in Yerevan. The ingredients had already been secretly prepped and a letter to Moscow with thousands of signatures of Armenians, petitioning an unconditional transfer of Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast (NKAO) of Azerbaijan SSR to Armenian SSR ensued. Note that the key word here is “unconditional” which means Armenians demanded an outright annexation of a part of the sovereign Azerbaijani territory of Nagorno-Karabakh to Armenia on grounds of population misbalance (76% Armenian versus 24% Azerbaijani) in favor of Armenians within the NKAO boundaries, whilst dismissing the entitlement, or its lack, thereof, for similar rights of 220 thousand Azerbaijanis densely populating Kafan, Mehri, Daralayez (Vayots Dzor), Basarkecher (Vardenis) districts to administrative political autonomy, let alone, unification with Azerbaijan proper.
And so the game plan played on. To avoid facing similar demands from the Azerbaijani minority in Armenian SSR, their complete and systematic expulsion from Armenia seemed the best option. November of 1987 delivered two railcars of first Azerbaijani refugees; January of next year – 4 buses. By the end of February, 1988, the number of the displaced was as high as 4 thousand. They were settled in urban areas such as Sumgait, Baku and Ganja. One may wonder as to why Azerbaijani refugees primarily expelled from rural areas of the aforementioned districts of Armenian SSR were placed in Azerbaijani cities instead of villages or settlements where they would have fit better.
The answer lies within the objective. The urban districts usually are subject to more visibility and are home to many more economic and socio-political interests at the disturbance of which a particular incident may escalate into a bigger event and subsequently spring back the reactive measures. In a village, where a population is limited to specific number, an interethnic violence would be contained to a minor local riot and would soon die off. In a city, much like Sumgait, Ganja and Baku, the unrest would likely start with a group of revengeful youth to grow into easily manipulated crowds dispersed in various districts of the city. They would harm people, break into shops, burn cars and clash with police, inevitably attracting attention of the pre-dispatched media, or simply designated people with video cameras.
And that is exactly what took place. Sumgait, as the most vivid example of manipulation of sensitive elements, would soon be assumed as the birthplace of Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, because the cameras, usually in no hurry to capture “spontaneous” events in a less attractive industrial backyard such as Sumgait, were there to capture the images of “angry Azerbaijani mobs” turning the city upside down, right from the first hours of February 27, 1988. One should not be surprised that three days later, on March 2, 1988, these images were publicly broadcast in Switzerland and the United States, although the press containment policy of the Soviet Union never facilitated such an action in other regions of Soviet Union.
In the days following massacre of 131 civilians in the streets of Baku by the Soviet Army in January 1990, TV and radio stations were shut off, the information was suppressed to prevent any leaks associated with the massacre to an outside international press. Nonetheless, the images of the violence in Sumgait never described the roots of the violent disturbances, the fact that both Armenians and Azeris died as a result. Neither did they inform about the three ethnic Armenian gang leaders, the most infamous of them being Eduard Grigoryan who was caught in the act, charged, sued and convicted who disappeared into the thin air once he was transferred to a Moscow prison.
The result yielding from Sumgait events was that the ethnic cleansing of Azerbaijanis from Armenia which started in November of 1987 went absolutely unnoticed while the image of a victimized Armenians in Sumgait arose with the piece of video camera tape rolled over and over for Western audiences.
During the next few months following Sumgait events, the Communist leadership in Azerbaijan would continuously convince the Azerbaijani public of unbreakable bond of friendship between Azerbaijani and Armenian peoples. All the while, Azerbaijani populated areas in Armenian were being emptied by forcible evictions fueled by nationalist aspirations of Armenia which eventually transformed this Soviet republic into a mono-ethnic entity with no single representatives of Azerbaijani ethnicity left behind by early 1990. By contrast, not only did the ethnic Armenians remained a sizable minority within Azerbaijan, excluding its Karabakh region, but they were able to retain their status of a 30 thousand-strong minority to this day, in an independent Azerbaijan, primarily living in urban areas such as the capital Baku, Sumgait and surrounding settlements.
History of the demographic changes within the context of the Karabakh conflict is rather “fascinating”, in a sense that historical Azerbaijani lands within the present day Armenia, where Azerbaijanis retained the absolute majority, such as Irevan, Sharur-Daralayez, Surmaly, parts of Novo-Bayazit uyezds as recent as the beginning of the 20th century, were systematically emptied of Azeris by Russian imperial authorities followed by Soviet leadership with establishment of USSR. The largest recorded displacement of Azerbaijanis from their native homeland what is now southern and eastern Armenia, was realized in 1948-1953, as per two infamous decrees by Soviet Union’s Council of Ministers numbered 4063 and 754. As a result, more than 100 thousand Azerbaijanis were relocated from regions of Armenia to lowlands of Azerbaijan, thus emptying living space for incoming Armenians from diaspora, primarily from Lebanon and Syria.
Nevertheless, ethnic Azerbaijanis remained in big numbers and constituted the biggest ethnic minority in Armenia until the beginning of Nagorno-Karabakh conflict in 1987. No socially and/or ethnically driven cultural rights were distinctly given and no autonomy was extended to Azeris, while Armenians enjoyed linguistic, cultural, social and more importantly, political governing rights within Azerbaijan. In the long run, it eventually contributed to illegitimate demands for an annexation of a part of a sovereign state to another.
With mobilized efforts to drive out all of the remaining Azerbaijani population of Armenia in late 1980’s, the Armenians sealed off the possible quest of Azerbaijani minority in Armenia for a cultural autonomy. What was left to do by the first quarter of 1990 was to play victim, force out the Azerbaijani population of Nagorno-Karabakh and unilaterally annex it to Armenia. The plan was realized with two effective instruments: terrorism throughout Azerbaijan outside of the conflict zone and massacres within the conflict zone.
The term “Armenian terrorism” came onto headlines in mid 1970’s when the terrorist organizations ASALA (Armenian Secret Army for Liberation of Armenia) and Justice Commandos for Armenian Genocide (JSAG), among many other smaller groups, have taken up a role of combating the Turkish civilians around the world for having allegedly committed “genocide” of Armenians in Anatolia in 1915. However, seeds of Armenian terrorism had been planted much earlier than 1915, when the Armenians of Turkey decided to form an ultranationalist Dashnaktsuitsuin (Armenian Revolutionary Federation) organization to establish a state in eastern Ottoman Empire at the end of the 19th century, at the behest of Russian imperial ambitions. From seizing a bank in Istanbul in 1896 to committing massacres of Azerbaijani civilians in Shusha during spring holidays in 1920, Dashnak militants have terrorized masses to the maximum extent. Decades later, a newer wave of Armenian terrorism in 1970’s-1980’s left dozens of Turkish civilians dead, subsiding to the minimal activity by 1985. With calls of Zori Balayan and Silva Kaputikian for annexation of Karabakh to Armenia, ultranationalist circles picked up the guns again. From Qazakh to Agdam, from Ganja to Baku, no Azerbaijani citizen was safe. Buses, trains, airplanes, subway traffic were subject to Armenian terrorist attacks. The last publicly known terrorist acts in Baku subway station were registered in Baku before and shortly after signing of ceasefire agreement between Azerbaijan and Armenia in May 1994. One of the largest atrocities was shooting down of Azerbaijani relief airplane en route to Armenia to participate in search and rescue operations and help the Armenian earthquake victims in December 1988. All but one of 77 Azerbaijanis on board died.
The second tool was terrorisation of local Azerbaijani population in Nagorno-Karabakh. Starting from late December 1989, Azerbaijanis were terrorized by public beatings, killings, grouped massacres throughout Karabakh, from Karkijahan suburb of Khankendi, Malibeyli, Gushchular to Garadaghly, all within a span of two months. Despite the villages of Malibeyli, Gushchular and Garadaghly rose in flames, the information on extermination of up to 140 civilians and complete ethnic cleansing of these villages was largely suppressed. The Azerbaijani residents of Karabakh still stood their ground. To break the confidence and intimidate the Azerbaijani population of the region, Armenians needed a debacle of bigger proportions which would put an end to hopes of peace and reconciliation. In the words of former Armenian president and then the commander of Armenian detachments Serzh Sargsyan: “Before Khojali, the Azerbaijanis thought that the Armenians were people who could not raise their hand against the civilian population. We were able to break that [stereotype]”[ref]Thomas de Waal, Black Garden: Armenia and Azerbaijan through Peace and War. New York and London, New York University Press, 2003, p. 172.[/ref]. He perfectly described the state of naïve trust and hope of the Azerbaijani party to the conflict which inadvertently fell victim to misguidance.
Starting with the headscarf of Khuraman Abbasova, a notable from Karabakh, thrown before the Azerbaijani crowd on February 22, 1988 near Askeran to prevent further bloodshed between Azerbaijani and Armenian people (It is an Azerbaijani tradition to respect an elderly woman and not step over her will once a “mother’s headscarf” is thrown before someone) after two Azeri youths, Ali Hajiyev and Bakhtiyar Guliyev, had fallen victims to Armenian bullets near Askeran, up until the underreported massacres in Garadaghly on February 17, 1992, Azerbaijanis were being convinced by the leadership that the friendship between Armenians and Azeris will live on. Khojaly proved otherwise. A rather unnoticed town of about 2,000 Azerbaijanis in early 1992, Khojaly was encircled by now Armenian occupied villages. In early months of that year, the town had already been living under blockade for several months in a row. The only communication to the town was by helicopter, delivering food and medical supplies. That was history by end of January, when the last helicopter with civilians on board was shot down by Armenian grenade launcher near Shusha. Hungry, cold, ignored and unprotected, Khojaly was enduring its last days.
Should the Armenians have kept a blockade alive for a few more weeks, the Azerbaijani residents would most likely have no choice but to either surrender or leave the town altogether.
However, the plan envisioned by Armenian army was not just to seize the town, but to subdue the Azerbaijani trust and break the promise of reconciliation in Karabakh. The intent was clear: occupy, exterminate and expose. The plan was to be enforced by several Armenian guerilla detachments, 366th regiment of the Russian army headed by Armenian officers and the missionaries.
Enter Monte Melkonian, the infamous terrorist who planned and executed murders of Turkish diplomats in Europe, spent time in French prisons and is now the highly glorified hero of Armenia. Melkonian had been responsible for massacring Azerbaijani civilians in Garadaghly and Agdaban villages in 1992. In the words of his brother Markar Melkonian, who described his militant career in his book “My Brother’s Road: An American’s Fateful Journey to Armenia”, Khojaly for Monte was an “act of revenge”. It was a good opportunity for extermination of enemy civilians, whom members of Arabo and Aramo detachments stabbed to death.
Unlike other genocides of 1990s, such as one in Srebrenica, where 8 thousand Bosnian men of different age were executed by firing squads to diminish future Bosnian fighting capabilities, Khojaly where 613 civilians (among them 106 women, 83 children, 79 elderly) were massacred, was an atrocious act, vandalism and inhuman behavior. What really distinguished Khojaly Massacre was the derision, humiliation, tortures and rapes of the victims. Children were killed in front of their parents. Parents were tortured before the eyes of their children. Women were publicly raped. Eyes of the already diseased civilians were gauged out, tongues cut off, breasts chopped off, arms and legs broken, bodies decapitated. Not only was it a physical atrocity but also a psychological calamity. One Azeri woman from a group of fleeing civilians had to suffocate her infant child when they hid in the woods so that the Armenian militants following them would not hear the cries of the baby.
By the time Azerbaijani cameraman Chingiz Mustafayev and international journalists made their dangerous flight into the kill zone, the killing spree had ended. Only the soothing wind was telling the story of unimaginable proportions about violence inflicted on unarmed civilians. Dispersed throughout the hills, the bodies of children, women, and elderly lay unmoved, for one simple reason. They were Azerbaijani Turks. The pictures shot by Mustafayev profoundly changed what the conflict was really about. In the film, chopper sounds and shots from the Armenian guns on the horizon were the only background to crying Azerbaijani men who almost lost conscience when seeing the despicable act of terror committed by Armenian militants. Khojaly massacre, as well documented as it is, has become an inalienable part of Armenian military history. It serves as a well-deserved opprobrium of continued warfare waged on Azerbaijani and Turkish civilians for more than a century.
Perpetrators of Khojaly Massacre have not been prosecuted yet. Some were killed by Azerbaijani soldiers of Ganja regiment by Hasangaya village of Aghdara in summer of 1992; some have returned to Armenia to become heroes; some took executive positions such as the President of Armenia, Serzh Sarkissian and Defense minister Seyran Ohanian. In 2012, the Prosecutor’s office of Azerbaijan Republic disclosed the list of main actors charged with the Khojaly Massacre.
Following terror attacks on the Twin towers in Manhattan on September 11, President George W. Bush stated, “whether we bring our enemies to justice or bring justice to our enemies, justice will be done.” Mass murder in New York or mass murder in Khojaly, justice awaits them all.
Yusif Babanly is the co-founder and secretary of the US Azeris Network (USAN) and a member of the board of directors of Azerbaijani American Council.
Source: TurkishWeekly.net
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