Forbes: Amidst A Pandemic Genocidal Horrors Reawaken In Nagorno-Karabakh

Genocide Watch’s “GENOCIDE EMERGENCY: Azerbaijan in Artsakh” report states: “Due to its denial of past genocide against Armenians, its official use of hate speech, and the current targeting of civilians in Artsakh, Genocide Watch considers Azerbaijan to be at Stage 9: Extermination and Stage 10: Denial.” It concluded, Azerbaijani military offensives, using “laser guided drones supplied by Turkey and Israel,” against Artsakh civilians are “war crimes under the Geneva Conventions.”

It details the 1918 Azerbaijan Democratic Republic’s systematic extermination of the Armenian populations “in Azerbaijan and the provinces of Nakhichevan and Nagorno-Karabakh as an extension of the 1915 deportation and genocide of Ottoman Armenians.” It references how Azerbaijani forces in Baku slaughtered “at least 15,000 Armenian civilians during “September Days” and 1,000 Armenians in 1919-1920 in the Karabakh cities of Shusha and Khaibalikend.”

The offensive by Turkish-backed Azerbaijan violates the UN Secretary-General’s call in mid-March for an immediate global ceasefire to focus on the pandemic. Amnesty International’s Crisis Response experts “identified Israeli-made M095 DPICM cluster munitions that appear to have been fired by Azerbaijani forces.”

Haaretz veteran intelligence and strategic affairs analyst Yossi Melman, in an interview with Simon Spungin’s “Haaretz Podcast: Why is Israel arming Azerbaijan against Armenia?” called Turkey and Israel’s joint fight against Christian Armenians, “cynical.”

“Israel–the homeland of the Jews that perished in the Holocaust and Holocaust survivors–refuses to recognize the Armenian Genocide. As a Jew and as an Israeli, I can’t accept it. I understand what national interests mean. Israel should have inserted at least a grain of moral values in its foreign policy–Israel is just interested in selling, selling and selling weapons.” 

Azerbaijan refutes the legal right to self-determination of the Armenian population of Artsakh, and its independence following the fall of the Soviet Union. Negotiations for a peaceful resolution of the conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh) within the OSCE Minsk Group framework, co-chaired by Russia, U.S. and France have been held since 1992. The Republic of Armenia represents the interests of Artsakh’s indigenous Armenian population.

While Armenia and Azerbaijan’s foreign ministers met with U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in Washington last Friday, Artsakh continued to be bombed. Both sides agreed to a ceasefire–it was once again broken.