Azerbaijan’s Permanent Mission to the Council of Europe within the framework of the international information campaign “Justice for Khojaly!” organized a commemorative event in Strasbourg dedicated to the 32nd anniversary of the Khojaly genocide, Azernews reports.
Day: February 28, 2024
Armenian and Azerbaijani Foreign Ministers Ararat Nirzoyan and Jeyhun Bayramov will hold talks in Berlin today.
The two-day peace negotiations will take place from Wednesday at the guest house of German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock on the outskirts of the city, the ministry said in a statement. Baerbock will first meet the Foreign Ministers from both countries for bilateral talks.
The meeting follows talks between German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan, and President of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, earlier this month on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference, as well as a trip by Baerbock to Armenia and Azerbaijan in early November 2023.
Armenian, Azerbaijani FMs set to hold talks in Berlin – Public Radio of Armenia Public Radio of Armenia – Official Web site
“The Armenian Foreign Ministry’s allegations against Azerbaijan in its statement on the Sumgayit events are not only unfounded but also distort and falsify historical facts,” said spokesperson of Azerbaijan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs Aykhan Hajizada as he commented on the statement of the Armenian Foreign Ministry on the Sumgayit events, according to Azerbaijan in Focus, reporting AzerTac.
“This statement is an attempt at concealing acts of violence, mass expulsion of the Azerbaijani population in Armenia, terror against the Azerbaijani people, provocations, and the use of military force on ethnic grounds to carry out Armenia’s baseless and illegal territorial claims against Azerbaijan since the late 1980s.
We remind the Armenian Foreign Ministry that the ethnic turmoil in Sumgayit was an integral part of the purposeful and planned provocation by the leadership of USSR and Armenia, Armenian chauvinistic ideologists, and extremist organizations.
It is also worth pointing out that the USSR prosecutor general’s office opened a criminal case pertaining to the incident, which resulted in the identification of the rioters along with the co-conspirators, as well as of the total of 32 victims. The presence of 6 Azerbaijanis among the victims of the incident demonstrates that the riots were not perpetrated by Azerbaijanis.
We wish to inform the Armenian Foreign Ministry that Eduard Grigoryan, an Armenian national, instigated the incidents. He led the march, personally causing the deaths of 6 individuals and the rape of 3 Armenian women. Furthermore, numerous testimonies from Armenians residing in Sumgayit corroborate these accounts. Grigoryan, condemned to 12 years in prison by a court ruling, was moved to Armenia to serve his sentence and was later released from prison.
92 persons found guilty in the outcomes of the trial regarding the events in Sumgayit on February 27-29, 1988, were sentenced to imprisonment, and 1 person received capital punishment.
For comparison, in the late 1980s, during the forceful deportation of around 300 thousand individuals from the territories densely populated by Azerbaijanis in the Armenian SSR, no action was taken against those responsible for the deaths of over 200 Azerbaijanis.
The Armenian Foreign Ministry is also well-aware that none of the perpetrators of multiple war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by Armenia in various cities and villages, including Khojaly, during its military aggression against Azerbaijan, have yet been held legally accountable.
We remind the Armenian Foreign Ministry that the Republic of Azerbaijan has ended Armenia’s decades-long military occupation of parts of its internationally recognized sovereign territory, restoring its territorial integrity and sovereignty.
Instead of claiming that “ethnic cleansing” was carried out against Armenians and historical and religious monuments were targeted, it would be more beneficial for the Armenian side to consider the criminal acts committed not only on the territory of present-day Armenia, but also against Azerbaijanis and Azerbaijan’s heritage during the occupation,” Hajizada noted.
The post Azerbaijan’s Foreign Ministry responds to Armenia’s statement on Sumgayit events appeared first on Azerbaijan In Focus.
The Embassy of Israel in Baku, together with the Ministry of Internal Affairs and law enforcement agencies of Azerbaijan, held a joint exercise in its premises. The training is a part of the ongoing cooperation between the countries, aimed at solidifying and enhancing our… https://t.co/ab5jhDGhgw
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