Azerbaijan denies Nagorno-Karabakh ethnic cleaning claims: ‘Cannot settle for…’

Azerbaijan denied accusations of ethnic cleaning to clear the enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh of its ethnic Armenian inhabitants, and advised AFP its inhabitants have been free to remain or go.

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has a number of occasions accused Azerbaijan of ethnic cleaning for the reason that enclave’s decades-long push to interrupt away from Azerbaijani rule resulted in sudden defeat on September 20. On Saturday, Pashinyan mentioned greater than 100,000 of Nagorno-Karabakh’s estimated 120,000 inhabitants had fled to neighbouring Armenia.

“We cannot accept accusations of ethnic cleansing or genocide,” Hikmet Hajiyev, diplomatic advisor to Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, advised AFP in an interview Saturday.

“Ethnic cleansing is a forceful action, when somebody is using force against civilians — (which is) what exactly Armenia used against us, 30 years ago.” “But it doesn’t mean we will repeat the same. There was no single case of violence or atrocity against civilians. They attest this themselves,” Hajiyev claimed. “And there were no ‘Armenian’ civilians in Karabakh,” he added.

“We always considered them as Azerbaijan civilians but unfortunately an illegal separatist entity didn’t allow us to have direct communication with them,” he mentioned, of the ethnic Armenian separatists who ruled the enclave for 3 a long time.
He mentioned Azerbaijan had “engaged internal security troops to coordinate with the so-called local Armenian authorities”.
“They are still in control of the cities,” he added.

‘Re-integration’ talks

Nagorno-Karabakh’s ethnic Armenian authorities agreed on Thursday to dissolve their authorities and permit the primarily Christian enclave to develop into a proper a part of majority-Muslim Azerbaijan by the top of the yr. Baku and the separatist leaders are to carry talks on the transition in Stepanakert on Monday. Hajiyev mentioned discussions with the ethnic Armenians have been productive and centred on disarming its army.

Armenia has accused Azerbaijan of illegally arresting individuals and says the enclave’s inhabitants are fleeing out of concern of reprisals.

Hajiyev mentioned Azerbaijan had detained “five to six” individuals who it accused of “war crimes”. “We know that there were concerns in Armenia and international media that we will arrest all militaries,” he mentioned.

“They are free. If somebody puts downs his gun, they are free and they have decided on their own choice to go to the republic of Armenia.” As for civilians, “we opened the gate and respected their freedom of movement, freedom of choice”, Hajiyev added.

“The majority of them are saying: ‘I can’t live under the flag of Azerbaijan’. I can’t justify it, but I can understand and respect that. If they accept Azerbaijan citizenship, we will protect and ensure their rights and their security and we will establish a municipality system so that they can govern their affairs at a local level, and religious and cultural rights will be assured.”

Published On:

Oct 1, 2023