1088 replies to this topic

[Yervant1]

Asbarez.com

 

Azerbaijan Forces Again Fire at Armenian Border Positions

by Asbarez Staff

 

 April 9, 2024

 

in Armenia, Artsakh, Featured Story, Latest, News, Top Stories

 

Azerbaijani fire caused damage to civilian structures on Apr. 6

 

Azerbaijani forces continued their attacks against Armenian border positions in the border regions, with the defense ministry reporting shots fired late Monday evening.

Azerbaijani forces fired at Armenian positions near Aravus in the Syunik Province at around 10:50 p.m. local time Monday and then later at 10:55 p.m. local time near the Khoznavar village in Syunik, Armenia’s defense ministry reported.

This follow a weekend-long attack on Armenian positions that began on Friday and lasted into the early hours of Sunday.

Most of these attacks are preceded by statements by Azerbaijan’s defense ministry alleging that Armenian forces were initiating the attacks. Armenia’s defense ministry has unequivocally dismissed such accusations.

Local residents have been on edge due to the ongoing attacks, which have also resulted in damage to residential buildings and businesses.

Monday’s gunfire damaged the roof and a window in a house in the Tegh village, Armenia’s Internal Ministry reported.

 

 

https://asbarez.com/...bd97F6EdPI8ibBK

[Yervant1]

Armenpress.am

 

Anti-Armenian school olympiad in Azerbaijan proves Azerbaijani invasive aspirations against Armenia

 

 13:11, 12 April 2024

YEREVAN, 12 APRIL, ARMENPRESS. The anti-Armenian school olympiad to be organized in Azerbaijan proves that the Azerbaijani authorities are not going to give up their invasive and illegal aspirations against Armenia,"Geghard" Scientific Analytical Foundation said in a statement.

The statement issued by the Foundation reads as follows:

“The Azerbaijani media recently reported that on April 27, a school olympiad titled "Return to Western Azerbaijan" will take place. (The term "Western Azerbaijan" refers to an irredentist project claiming the territory of the Republic of Armenia.)

The event is organized by the Ministry of Science and Education of Azerbaijan, the Ministry of Education of Nakhijevan, the Institute of Education of Azerbaijan, Nakhijevan State University, and the so-called "Western Azerbaijan Community" organization.

According to the organizers, the aim of the olympiad is to “increase school children's knowledge of the history, geography, culture, literature, prominent historical figures, place names, and folklore” of the so-called "Western Azerbaijan," and to ensure a thorough examination of this knowledge.

This event is one of the manifestations of Azerbaijan's occupation policy. The Azerbaijani leadership does not disguise the character of its policy and has claimed on numerous occasions that “the territory of the Republic of Armenia is the 'historical homeland' of Azerbaijanis”, asserting that they must return there.

Ilham Aliyev reinstated this claim in 2022 during his visit to the administrative building of the "Western Azerbaijan Community". It is worth noting that the organization's activities are completely sponsored by the state and are directed towards elaborating and spreading these false theses.

This further highlights how hatred against Armenians is disseminated among young generations in Azerbaijan. It also underscores that the Azerbaijani authorities are not going to abondon their occupation and unlawful projects.

"Geghard" Scientific and Analytical Foundation condemns these and other similar anti-Armenian events organized under the auspices of the Azerbaijani authorities. It also draws the attention of the international community to Azerbaijan's aggressive policy and the threat it poses to the territorial integrity of the Republic of Armenia.”

 

 

https://armenpress.a...XfbQ4NZoVqTcu2V

[Yervant1]

yahoo! news

April 15 2024

 

 

AFP

Azerbaijan accuses Armenia of 'media campaign' at UN top court

Jan HENNOP

Azerbaijan and Armenia again crossed swords before the UN's top court on Monday, with Baku accusing Yerevan of using the high profile hearings to wage a "public media campaign" against its bitter Caucasus rival.

The latest legal clash over "ethnic cleansing" comes as military tensions are again ramping up between the neighbours following the conflict in the disputed mountainous area of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Robed lawyers and representatives from the two countries embarked on two weeks of hearings, wrestling over interpretations of international law in the gilded Peace Palace of the International Court of Justice in The Hague.

 

Azerbaijan's representative Elnur Mammadov told judges Armenia's lawsuit was "premature" and urged the court to throw out the case.

"That is because Armenia failed to engage in negotiations with Azerbaijan in an attempt to settle" the dispute, he said.

There were "limited negotiations" but Yerevan "failed to pursue them," Mammadov said.

"From the outset Armenia had it sights firmly set on commencing these proceedings before the court... and using the fact of these proceedings to wage a public media campaign against Azerbaijan," Mammadov said.

- Tit-for-tat lawsuits -

The legal battle before the ICJ dates from September 2021 when each side filed tit-for-tat suits against each other within a week.

They accused each other of "ethnic cleansing" and of violating the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (CERD).

The ICJ, which rules in disputes between states, issued emergency orders in December 2021, calling on both parties to prevent incitement and promotion of racial hatred.

But while the ICJ's orders are binding, it has no enforcement mechanism and tensions grew, culminating in Azerbaijan's lightning offensive last September in the disputed territory of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Baku reclaimed Karabakh in the one-day offensive, prompting the enclave's entire ethnic Armenian population -- more than 100,000 people -- to flee for Armenia.

Weeks later, Armenia returned to the ICJ, urging the court to order Azerbaijan to withdraw its troops from Karabakh and allow Armenian refugees to return home safely.

In November, the court ordered Azerbaijan to allow anyone wishing to return to Karabakh to do so in a "safe, unimpeded and expeditious manner".

The latest hearings, that run until April 26, concern objections raised by both parties to each other's original cases filed in September 2021.

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev have said, however, that a comprehensive peace agreement is within reach after last year's offensive in Karabakh.

The former Soviet republics have fought two wars for control of the mountainous region -- most recently in 2020 and in the early 1990s amid the break-up of the Soviet Union -- that have claimed thousands of lives on both sides and caused hundreds of thousands to flee.

Villages on both sides were destroyed and the mountainous region has been littered with countless landmines in the conflict's aftermath.

The conflict has also strained ties between Russia and ex-Soviet Armenia, with Yerevan considering that Moscow did not do enough to help when it was under attack.

In February, Armenia formally joined the International Criminal Court (ICC), despite Moscow warning against the move.

It is now obliged to arrest Russian President Vladimir Putin if he sets foot on Armenian territory under an ICC arrest warrant issued for the Russian leader in March 2023.

jhe-ric/tw

https://www.yahoo.co...-052554714.html

[Yervant1]

‘Israel-Azerbaijan Relationship Relies on

Unholy Trinity of Oil, Arms & Intelligence’

 

By Harut Sassounian

www.TheCaliforniaCourier.com

The Israeli newspaper Haaretz published on April 11 a revealing article about the extensive high-level links between Azerbaijan and Israel, titled: “How Strategic Relations with Azerbaijan Became the Business of the Lieberman Family.” The article was written by investigative reporter Gur Megiddo.

Avigdor Lieberman was a high-ranking Israeli government official who made multiple trips to Baku, more than any other Israeli politician, meeting each time with Pres. Ilham Aliyev and other high-ranking Azeri leaders. He served twice as Deputy Prime Minister of Israel, and became successively minister at six different ministries: National Infrastructure, Transportation, Strategic Affairs, Foreign Affairs (twice), Defense, and Finance.

Lieberman was not the only Israeli official who traveled to Azerbaijan. Israel’s defense ministers Benny Gantz and Yoav Gallant also visited Baku, in addition to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in 2016 and President Isaac Herzog in 2023.

Megiddo stated that “the Israel-Azerbaijan relationship relies on an unholy trinity of oil, arms and intelligence. Israel buys oil from Azerbaijan (about half of Israel's crude oil originates there), and sells it advanced military equipment. In return, Azerbaijan reportedly gives it access to its land and sea border with Israel's number one rival: Iran.”

Azerbaijan was victorious in the Artsakh wars of 2020 and 2023, “thanks in no small part to game-changing weaponry supplied by Israel,” including the Israeli Hermes and Harop drones, and other sophisticated weapons bought for billions of dollars. Azerbaijan purchased some of these drones while Lieberman was Defense Minister.”

During Lieberman’s visit to Baku in 2012, he was asked about a Foreign Policy magazine article which quoted a senior U.S. government official as saying that: "the Israelis have bought an airfield, and the airfield is called Azerbaijan. The names of several former Soviet air force bases were mentioned that, according to the magazine's sources, were or would be placed at Israel's disposal in anticipation of a possible airstrike” on Iran. Lieberman called the story “science fiction” that has “no connection to reality.” However, The Times of London reported that the “Israeli espionage agency Mossad has a base in Azerbaijan.”

“By any standard, Azerbaijan is a dictatorship” ranked 130th out of 167 countries by the Economist Intelligence Unit in 2023. A delegation of four Israeli Knesset members led by Lieberman went to Azerbaijan ostensibly to oversee the presidential elections. They dismissed the reports of irregularities in the elections which Aliyev had won with a whopping 85%. They falsely described Azerbaijan as “the only democracy in the Middle East.” Lieberman called Aliyev’s victory “a good lesson for some forces who, unjustly, criticize Azerbaijan.”

When Israeli-Russian blogger Aleksander Lapshin was arrested and jailed in Baku for visiting Artsakh, his family asked then-Defense Minister Lieberman to intervene, but he did not lift a finger, even after Lapshin was attacked by the prison security personnel, trying to kill him. Lapshin believes that the Russians ultimately helped secure his release.

Megiddo reported that Lieberman’s two sons -- Amos and Kobi -- have a “deep business relationship” with Azerbaijan’s government. “The Lieberman brothers, it turns out, spend a lot of time in Baku, where they are considered intermediaries who know how to open doors to the government. In recent years, Lieberman's sons have marketed a number of Israeli high-tech products to the government of Azerbaijan: a cyberoffense product made by the cybersecurity company Candiru; a big data system for improving tax collection by another cybersecurity firm, Rayzone; and water desalination technologies by the Israeli company IDE. The potential commissions from brokering these three ventures alone could reach millions of dollars. Additionally, until recently, the Lieberman brothers represented Azerbaijan Airlines (the national flag carrier controlled by the state) in Israel.”

Several Israeli firms like Pegasus and Candiru sold spyware to Azerbaijan to hack the phones of the regime’s opponents. Today, 18 Azeri journalists are in jail. The Candiru sale was mediated by Lieberman’s two sons in exchange for a commission, “estimated at hundreds of thousands of dollars.” From a deal with cyberfirm Rayzone, they earned “a commission of about $200,000,” according to ‘TheMarker,’ published by Haaretz. Lieberman’s office stated that “he is not involved in his children’s businesses.”

Lieberman’s children also represented IDE Technologies which is planning on building a large water desalination facility in Azerbaijan. This is “a project whose cost may reach hundreds of millions of dollars -- and the commission for the Lieberman brothers would presumably rise accordingly,” Megiddo wrote.

Megiddo wondered: “Do you think the two sons would have attained such significant status with the Azerbaijan government if not for their family connection?” A businessman was quoted as saying: “I can say about the Azerbaijanis that they're the kind of people who know how to say thank you. If you do good things for them and they appreciate you -- they know how to say thanks, both in words and deeds."

Megiddo concluded: “there's probably no one within the Israeli establishment who would dispute the many benefits Israel derives from its ugly but perhaps vital relationship with Azerbaijan. But there is no contradiction between these two statements: the warm relations with the morally dubious rule of President Ilham Aliyev can be part of an Israeli national security strategy, and at the same time also part of the Lieberman family's business strategy.”

 

[Yervant1]

France 24
April 17 2024


France recalls its ambassador to Azerbaijan, accuses Baku of 'damaging' ties

France on Tuesday said it had recalled for consultations the French ambassador to Azerbaijan, accusing Baku of taking actions that have damaged the bilateral relationship.

President Emmanuel Macron received ambassador Anne Boillon in Paris to discuss the issue, the foreign ministry said in a statement, accusing Azerbaijan of continuing "in recent months unilateral actions damaging to the relationship between our two countries".

Relations between Azerbaijan and France -- a traditional ally of Armenia and host itself to a significant Armenian diaspora community -- have long been plagued by tensions focused on the Azerbaijani region of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Seized by Armenian separatists in a war as the USSR fell, Azerbaijani forces regained control of much of the region in a 2020 conflict and then the remaining part in the lightning September 2023 offensive.

Macron and other French officials have long voiced concern Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev will not stop there and has designs on Armenian territory.

In his meeting with Boillon, the French president said he "regretted Azerbaijan's actions and expressed a wish for clarification by the Azerbaijani side of its intentions", the foreign ministry said.

There have been attempts to move forward talks on normalising relations between Azerbaijan and Armenia but these so far have made little progress.

"France reiterates its support for the normalisation of relations between Azerbaijan and Armenia, while respecting international law and the territorial integrity of the two countries," the ministry said.

As relations with Moscow fray, Armenia is also increasingly relying on defence cooperation with France.

In February, Armenia agreed a deal for the purchase of precision rifles from French arms manufacturer PGM, though its price tag was not disclosed.

In October 2023, France announced the sale of defence equipment -- three radar systems and night vision goggles -- to Armenia, provoking anger from Azerbaijan.

(AFP)

https://www.france24...f-damaging-ties

[Yervant1]

PR Newswire

April 18 2024

 

 

The International Criminal Court Could Investigate President Aliyev for Genocide Against the Armenians

NEWS PROVIDED BY

Center for Truth and Justice 

Apr 18, 2024, 08:54 ET

 

• Communication follows an exhaustive investigation into the genocide of Armenians in Armenian territory under the unlawful occupation of Azerbaijan
• Intent to commit genocide unequivocally proven by statements made by President Aliyev and Azerbaijan's Parliament
• It is the first genocide where the intent is expressed by a parliament that aims to remove the entire Armenian population from their lands calling it "Western Azerbaijan"
• Armenian women were sexually mutilated, killed, and filmed for social media to terrorize and produce mental harm to the entire Armenian population, another form of genocide

THE HAGUE, Netherlands, April 18, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- The Center for Truth and Justice (CFTJ) is petitioning the International Criminal Court (ICC) to open a preliminary examination into the ongoing genocide being perpetrated by Azerbaijan's armed forces against ethnic Armenians in Armenian territory under the unlawful occupation of Azerbaijan since May 12, 2021. The submission includes access to testimonial evidence gathered and recorded by the CFTJ that corroborates the alleged policy of genocide being planned, instigated, and implemented by President Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan, including their Parliament. 

 

Center for Truth and Justice

 

The petition outlines a vast array of atrocities carried out by the Armed Forces of Azerbaijan under the leadership of President Aliyev: forcible displacement of at least 7000 civilians, murder of civilians, enforced disappearance of at least 2000 civilians and prisoners of war (PoWs), arbitrary detention, sexual violence, at least 350 documented cases of torture and extrajudicial executions of ethnic Armenian PoWs.

 

The petition by the US-based NGO, which is dedicated to documenting war crimes in the South Caucasus, asks the ICC for a preliminary examination to evaluate whether there is a reasonable basis for a formal investigation of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and others accused of planning, inciting, ordering, and executing a state policy of genocide against Armenians.

This is the first case of any entity lodging a case at the ICC for genocide of Armenians, and it comes days before the April 24 annual commemoration of the World War I-era genocide in which Ottomans killed 1.5 million Armenians.

"This is an emotionally heavy moment, as we never considered that a second genocide against our people would occur within our lifetime," said Armenian-descended Gassia Apkarian, a Superior Court judge in Orange County and CFTJ advisor. "The ICC should send a clear message that there will be no impunity for such crimes and those responsible for genocide will be held accountable."

The filing details a deliberate Azerbaijani strategy to eradicate ethnic Armenians, both in attacks on sovereign Armenian territory and in actions against the disputed enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh (also known as Artsakh), which was blockaded by Azerbaijan from Dec. 2022 until an attack in Sept. 23 which caused the population of 150,000 to flee to Armenia. In all cases, Azerbaijan used advanced weaponry to target civilian populations.

That blockade was described as a genocide attempt in an  Aug. 2023 report by Luis Moreno Ocampo, the former ICC chief prosecutor – a position since backed by the International Court of Justice in its preliminary orders, as well as other leading global experts and jurists. The resulting exodus last fall was one of the largest genocide in recent history.

"Sadly, the world community has largely ignored this war crime, a clear case of genocide under Article 2© of the Genocide Convention, so it is time for the international legal system to address this breakdown of the world order," Ocampo said of the filing.

Beyond Aliyev, the filing personally targets Azerbaijani Minister of Defense Zakir Hasanov and Chief of General Staff Karim Valiyev for their role in the alleged state policy of genocide – including forcibly removing Armenians from occupied territories, systematically killing civilians and prisoners of war, and engaging in hate speech that dehumanizes Armenians.

Aliyev's public statements, glorifying the removal and destruction of Armenians, further demonstrate genocidal intent, the petition argues. Aliyev has openly referred to Armenians as "rats" and "dogs," as "devils" and "barbarians" and a "virus" – and several years ago declared that they "have neither conscience nor morality. They do not even have a brain." Aliyev himself said as top officials in Baku celebrated the forced displacement of Armenians from Nagorno-Karabakh.

Moreover, since May 2021, Azerbaijan's armed forces have engaged in an unlawful military campaign aimed at annexing approximately 200 square kilometers of Armenian sovereign territory. In Armenia´s provinces of Gegarkunik, Syunik, Vayots Dzor, Tavoush and Ararat.

The dossier of evidence gathered by the CFTJ contains over 530 testimonies from representatives of victims and from witnesses detailing atrocities, war crimes, and genocide. There is evidence of widespread atrocities committed against ethnic Armenian women, including mutilation and sexual violence, as part of a systematic campaign to terrorize and subjugate in order to destroy the Armenian population. Over 1500 items of open-source evidence reflecting intention to commit genocide back the claim. The research and interviews were carried out by 121 trained lawyers and law students in Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh.

Present at the Hague will be Lala Abgaryan, whose sister Gayane was killed in 2022 by Azerbaijani soldiers, suffering extensive abuse and mutilations that were then recorded and glorified online. She took in the orphaned children and gave extensive testimony, and will be available to the media.

The CFTJ 's investigation reveals that stickers depicting tortured Armenian women were downloaded by approximately 20,000 Azerbaijani users within even a five-day period.

ABOUT THE CFTJ:

CFTJ is a 501©(3) nonprofit organization, established in November 2020 in response to the Nagorno-Karabakh war. We are a group of lawyers overseeing the collection of firsthand testimonial evidence from war survivors via in-depth, recorded interviews. We run a law clinic in Yerevan, Armenia, which is the first of its kind. Through our clinic, we train law students and young lawyers to interview survivors of the war and record their testimonies. To date, we have conducted hundreds of interviews and trained over 100 current or future lawyers. By being a permanent home for the testimonials, CFTJ serves as a resource to academic and legal practitioners who seek to use the evidence for purposes of education and/or legal action.

MEDIA CONTACT:

Maggie Arutyunyan at 1(818)749-8185

SOURCE Center for Truth and Justice

https://www.prnewswi...-302120495.html

[Yervant1]

ABC News

April 18 2024

 

Armenian victims group asks International Criminal Court to investigate genocide claim

A human rights organization representing ethnic Armenians has submitted evidence to the International Criminal Court arguing that Azerbaijan is committing an ongoing genocide against them

 

By MOLLY QUELL, Associated Press and MIKE CORDER, Associated Press

 

THE HAGUE, Netherlands -- A human rights organization representing ethnic Armenians submitted evidence to the International Criminal Court on Thursday, arguing that Azerbaijan is committing an ongoing genocide against them.

Azerbaijan’s government didn't immediately comment on the accusations. The neighboring countries have been at odds for decades over the territory of Karabakh, and are already facing off in a separate legal case stemming from that conflict.

Lawyers for the California-based Center for Truth and Justice, or CFTJ, say there is sufficient evidence to open a formal investigation into Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and other top leaders for genocide. They have submitted a so-called Article 15 communication urging the court’s chief prosecutor Karim Khan to look into alleged atrocities.

Khan’s office will now consider the evidence submitted and determine if the court will open an investigation, a decision expected to take months.

“My goal here is to get the highest bodies that protect human rights to take some action, not just mere words,” Lala Abgaryan, whose sister Gayane was killed by Azerbaijani soldiers in 2022, told The Associated Press.

Her sister’s body was badly mutilated and images of the abuse were spread online. Abgaryan says the pictures were so heinous that she suffered psychological damage after looking at them.

Long-standing tensions between Armenia and Azerbaijan erupted in 2020 into a war over Karabakh that left more than 6,600 people dead. The region is within Azerbaijan but had been under the control of ethnic Armenian forces since the end of a separatist war in 1994.

Last year, following a lightning military campaign, Azerbaijan retook the disputed territory. After Azerbaijan regained full control of Karabakh, which had a population of around 120,000, more than 100,000 of the region’s ethnic Armenians fled, although Azerbaijan said they were welcome to stay and promised their human rights would be ensured.

Prior to Azerbaijan’s offensive, Armenia and former International Criminal Court chief prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo accused Azerbaijan of committing genocide by creating conditions aimed at destroying Karabakh Armenians as a group.

A group of around 30 people gathered in the rain in front of The Hague-based court Thursday to hand over more than 100 pages of documents.

The rights organization said it has submitted a dossier of evidence containing the testimony of more than 500 victims and witnesses.

“These atrocities are captured on social media, by Azerbaijani soldiers themselves, where you hear them laughing, making comments, and taking the dead bodies that they’ve just slaughtered and beheaded,” CFTJ leader Gassia Apkaria told the AP.

Legal experts say that genocide may be out of reach for the court. Armenia is a member of the ICC, but Azerbaijan isn't, leaving prosecutors with jurisdiction only over crimes committed on Armenian territory. Karabakh is internationally recognized as part of Azerbaijan.

Forcing nearly the entire population to relocate to Armenia, however, could fall within the court’s remit. Deportation is considered a crime against humanity. While Azerbaijan did not deport the people who fled last year, they left under duress.

“There is no way this was an exodus by chance,” says Mel O’Brien, an associate professor of international law at the University of Western Australia and genocide expert.

The court has moved forward with an investigation under similar circumstances into possible crimes committed by Myanmar against the Rohingya minority group. While Myanmar isn't a member state, neighboring Bangladesh is and around 750,000 people have fled across the border after being forced from their homes.

The CFTJ’s request came amid two weeks of proceedings between Armenia and Azerbaijan at another global court in The Hague. The United Nations' top court, the International Court of Justice, is hearing arguments related to a pair of cases stemming from the conflict. Each country has accused the other of violating a racial discrimination treaty.

___

Associated Press writer Jim Heintz in Tallinn, Estonia, contributed to this report.

https://abcnews.go.c...ocide-109386410

[Yervant1]

April 19 2024

 

 

Azerbaijan reportedly destroys Armenian church in Shusha

 19 April 2024

ByArshaluys Barseghyan

Satellite imagery showing the St Hovhannes Mkrtich church in December 2023 (left) and April 2024 (right). Image via Caucasus Heritage Watch.

The Caucasus Heritage Watch has reported that Azerbaijan has destroyed a 177-year-old church in the city of Shusha (Shushi), in Nagorno-Karabakh.

On Thursday, Caucasus Heritage Watch, an open-source cultural sites watchdog, reported that the St Hovhannes Mkrtich church had been destroyed by Azerbaijan.

They analysed satellite imagery appearing to show that the church was completely destroyed between 28 December 2023 and 4 April 2024.

St. Hovhannes Mkrtich Church in Shusha. Image via Caucasus Heritage Watch.

The group covers the erasure of Armenian heritage in Nagorno-Karabakh.

Azerbaijan has previously been accused of destroying or erasing Christian Armenian heritage in Nagorno-Karabakh. Following the end of the Second Nagorno-Karabakh War in 2020, Azerbaijani authorities openly accused Armenians of appropriating what they said were Caucasian Albanian monuments and churches — referring to a Christian kingdom that existed in the South Caucasus in the first millennium.

[Read more: The battle over Christian monuments in Nagorno-Karabakh]

‘In the aftermath of the war, the Baku diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church laid claim to the building and pledged restoration. Nevertheless, the church is now gone’, said Caucasus Heritage Watch of the church, whose erasure they called the most ‘egregious violation yet of a December order by the International Court of Justice’. 

 

The UN Court obliged Azerbaijan to take ‘all necessary measures to prevent and punish acts of vandalism and desecration affecting Armenian cultural heritage’.

Monument Watch, an Armenian academic platform focused on cultural heritage in Nagorno-Karabakh, stated that the church was built by Hovhannes and Baba Stepanyan Hovnanents in dedication to their deceased brother Mkritch in 1847. 

However, some other Armenian sources claim the church was built in 1818. 

After Azerbaijan took control of Shusha during the 2020 war, Fip, an Armenian fact-checking platform, claimed that the church’s dome and bell tower were ‘almost completely destroyed’, citing footage posted on Azerbaijani social media.

At the time, Fip reported that it was one of the city’s only two functioning churches before the war.

Baku has also announced that it is restoring the Ghazanchetsots Cathedral, the other church in Shusha, to its ‘original form’, which Yerevan maintains is ‘vandalism […] aimed at depriving the Shushi Mother Cathedral of its Armenian identity’.

https://oc-media.org...urch-in-shusha/

[Yervant1]

Armenpress.am

 

If Azerbaijan posed no threat, why did Armenians leave Nagorno-Karabakh?" - Sean Murphy in UN Court

 

 17:12, 19 April 2024

YEREVAN, APRIL 19, ARMENPRESS.  Sean Murphy, the representative of the Armenian delegation at the International Court of Justice, stated during the hearing of the "Armenia vs. Azerbaijan" case at the UN Court that if Azerbaijan posed no threat to the Armenian population of Nagorno-Karabakh, why had more than 100,000 people left their ancestral homes in September, 2023. 

Sean Murphy stated in his speech that after studying the evidence within the court case, the Azerbaijani representatives, surprisingly, could not see the evidence confirming the racial discrimination against Armenian civilians.

Touching upon the widespread Armenianophobia in Azerbaijan and the statements made by the country's president, Ilham Aliyev, towards the Armenian people, Murphy said: "I will not present all the statements made by President Aliyev, which have been made and which ultimately form part of our evidence. 

But, in our view, these statements demonstrate racial animosity, or at least at this stage of jurisdiction, they can be considered as such.

He added that the government of Azerbaijan generally propagates and spreads hatred against ethnic Armenians. "If Azerbaijan is not a threat, then why did more than 100,000 ethnic Armenians, including 30,000 children, flee their ancestral homeland within a few days in September 2023?" noted the representative of the Armenian delegation at the International Court of Justice.

Sean Murphy added that it is evident that the words of Azerbaijani officials were correctly understood by all ethnic Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh. They understood that these threats were directed not only against the former leaders of Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh, but primarily against themselves.

"That's why they left their homes. The reason lies in this threat and the perception it creates, which has been developed by the Azerbaijani government for decades," Murphy concluded.

 

 

https://armenpress.a...sXE-BNvCvWJOMae