The Armenian National Committee of Australia (ANC-AU) condemns in the strongest terms the grave actions of Azerbaijan’s authoritarian military dictatorship, who this week violated the line of contact into the Republic of Artsakh (Nagorno Karabakh), violating the November 2020 Ceasefire Agreement between Baku and Yerevan brokered by Russia.
On Friday 25th March, these attacks peaked with four Armenian soldiers killed and a further 14 wounded by Azerbaijani fire, while the citizens of Artsakh have been freezing in sub-zero temperatures due to Baku cutting off their access to gas for the second time in the matter of weeks.
Since the Ukraine crisis began, Azerbaijan has exploited it as cover to indiscriminately shell several civilian villages in the occupied Armenian territories of Nagorno Karabakh (Republic of Artsakh). This includes the villages of Nor Shen and Khramort, after which Azerbaijan’s military personnel utilised loudspeakers ordering the indigenous Armenian population to leave their homeland or be forcibly removed.
In parallel to this campaign of ethnic cleaning and cultural genocide, the Aliyev regime deliberately severed a pipeline near occupied Shushi on 8th, which carries gas from Armenia to Artsakh. Despite mediation by Russian peacekeepers forcing Azerbaijan’s delayed repair of the line, gas supply was halted again on Tuesday. Experts say it is clear Azerbaijani “repairs” included the installation of valves to control gas entering the Republic of Artsakh.
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This incident represents another example of the grave human rights violations caused to over 100,000 Armenian men, women and children in Artsakh, who have been left without heat in sub-zero conditions. Several international bodies, including the European Union, have expressed their concern over the issue and called on Azerbaijan to urgently restore gas flows to Artsakh’s residents.
In addition, several non-governmental organisations such as Freedom House have also criticised the disruption of gas supply to Artsakh by Azerbaijan, noting the potential humanitarian crisis unfolding during weeks of freezing temperatures in the region.
However, it is Azerbaijan’s latest act of aggression and violation of international law that is most concerning as its armed forces embarked on a premeditated provocation, crossing the line of contact and occupying the Armenian village of Parukh and surrounding areas, depopulating the peaceful Armenian villagers. As a safety precaution, women and children from the nearby village of Khramort have been evacuated and, now, the first Armenian deaths and injuries have been reported.
In response, Artsakh’s Foreign Minister David Babayan has stated that “Azerbaijan is attempting to terrorise the population” through the processes of ethnic cleansing and cultural genocide learnt from their Ottoman forebears responsible for the 1915 mass deportation and execution of 1.5 million Armenian men, women and children during the Armenian, Assyrian and Greek Genocides.
Azerbaijan’s emboldened actions demonstrate once more that petro-dictator Aliyev is taking advantage of the global—especially Russia’s—focus on the Ukraine crisis to provoke, threaten and attack the peaceful population of Artsakh. As many Armenians recall, the 2020 Artsakh War was launched during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in which the world’s attention was preoccupied.
In the past month, Azerbaijan has repeated its tactics that led to the 2020 Nagorno Karabakh War by carrying out provocations and threats against the peaceful indigenous Armenian population of Artsakh at a time when the international community’s attention is captivated elsewhere.
Aliyev’s ongoing policy of ethnic and religious Armenophobic hatred must be condemned by Australia’s Government, as without action by the international community, the Armenian population of Artsakh face the very real and growing possibility of genocide within their historic lands.
We call on the international community and the OSCE Minsk Group-endorsed Russian peacekeeping forces, which were deployed after the 2020 cease-fire agreement, to ensure that Azerbaijani military forces return to their original ceasefire positions immediately and withdraw from the village of Parukh and surrounding areas.
Anything less than this will only reward and encourage further military aggression and attempted ethnic cleansing by Azerbaijan.
Armenian National Committee of Australia
