Baku takes the issue of Azerbaijanis who left Armenia out of context to attack Armenia: Daniel Ioannisyan’s speech at the HDIM meeting of the OSCE participating states

The OSCE ODIHR Human Dimensions Conference is taking place in Warsaw these days․ In his speech on October 3, Daniel Ioannisyan, Programs Coordinator at Union of Informed Citizens NGO, touched upon Azerbaijan’s policy of Armenophobia and laying the ground for a new aggression against Armenia, exploiting the false thesis of “West Azerbaijan”.

«Thank you, madame moderator,

As it was discussed before, more than 99,9 percent of Armenians of Nagorno Karabakh left their homes when Azerbaijan took control after its launched large-scale and pre-planned military attack in September 2023. Just within several days, more than 100 thousand people became refugees. They left their homes, all their belongings, except those that would fit in their cars.

Unfortunately, in the visible future they can not go back, because Armenophobia is widespread in Azerbaijan. Killing an unarmed sleeping Armenian is considered a heroism. None of those 100 thousand people even tried to go to their home to pick-up their left belongings.

Our colleagues from Freedom House and other human rights organizations have prepared a very detailed report on how this ethnic cleansing was organized and why there are no Armenians left in Nagorno Karabakh. They are going to present the report during their side event here, in this plenary hall, on Monday at 4 p.m..

Ladies and gentlemen,

Some Azerbaijani GONGOs mention ethnic Azerbajianians who left Armenia 30 years ago, but they are silent about ethnic Armenians who left Azerbaijan back in those days. They just said, that there are thousands of Armenians living in Azerbaijan – but that is absolutely not true.

It’s funny that Azerbajiani representatives are making statements that goes against data published by their State Statistics Committee. Just found in their official web-site, that out of half million of Armeians in Azerbaijan 35 years ago, now just 200 are remaining. Not 200.000, but just 200.

And that is the result of the massacre of Armenians living in Azerbaijan. Particularly, in 1988 in Sumgait and 1990 in Baku. Nothing similar has ever happened to Azerbaijanis in Armenia.

Of course I would like to see environment, where ethnic Armenians from Baku, Sumgait, Gyanja and other regions of Azerbaijan, ethnic Azerbajianians from Armenia and, of course, ethnic Armenians from Nagorno Karabakh can return to their homes, or, at least, manage their property, visit graves of their family members.

But for that Azerbaijan should stop state support of armenophobia, Azerbaijan should act as a real peace supporter and Azerbaijan should start to respect human rights.

But that’s not what they want to do. They are trying to take out the context of the issue of ethnic Azerbajanians who left Armenia 35 years ago to create grounds for another aggression against Armenia, which they call “Western Azerbaijan”.

Thank you».