2024-09-14 19:45:37
The Zovighian Partnership (ZP) Co-Founder and CEO Lin Zovikian presented his extensive article “Azerbaijan Rewarded One Year After Lachin Corridor Blockade and Genocide” in Newsweek, based on his work with the research group.
The author writes that 2 months after receiving a 10-month investigative mission, when the Lachin Corridor in Artsakh was blocked and when “the Armenians of Artsakh were completely cut off from the world and declared that genocide was being committed”, on September 19, 2023, Azerbaijan on a large scale launched a military attack on Artsakh and won a decisive victory in 24 hours.
“More than 99 percent of Artsakh Armenians have left their centuries-old homeland, leaving empty cities and villages that are ready for the full implementation of Aliyev’s Great Return. The multi-stage strategy of genocide, reinforced by unconventional and conventional war strategies, succeeded,” the author writes.
Despite this, Lin Zovikyan writes that the government of Azerbaijan is funding and conducting an international confidence campaign that denies the suffering of Artsakh Armenians. “Many members of the international community chose to believe the perpetrator and failed to fulfill their obligations as States Parties to the Genocide Convention to prevent the genocide against the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh. After the complete forced transfer of the population, Azerbaijan adopted a new diplomatic policy. On the one-year anniversary of the blockade of the Lachine Corridor, instead of being held accountable for multiple war crimes and genocide, Azerbaijan recently won a bid to host next year’s UN Climate Summit (COP29), the author writes.
He notes that even today the blockade and genocide continue. “Artsakh Armenian culture, heritage and private property are still under siege, leaders and citizens are still being held under arbitrary detention, and there is no right to go back through the Lachin Corridor and return home. The comprehensive siege of Artsakh was a complex undertaking that required deep intelligence and imagination. The question is whether Azerbaijan is committing genocide alone, or whether it has complicit partners,” he writes.
Satellite images show the exodus of Armenians as thousands flee Nagorno Karabakh.