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Illegal visits to Nagorno-Karabakh violation of int’l law

26 September 2014 19:53 (UTC+04:00)
Illegal visits to Nagorno-Karabakh violation of int’l law

By Sara Rajabova

Any visit to Nagorno-Karabakh without Azerbaijan's permission is a flagrant violation of international law and national legislation. Now Armenia aims to legalize the occupation of Azerbaijani territories with organizing visits of foreign citizens and parliamentarians to these territories.

Chairman of the Council of State Support to NGOs (CSSN) under the President of Azerbaijan, Azay Guliyev made the remark while addressing an international conference called "Legal consequences of illegal visits to the occupied territories of Eastern Partnership countries".

The conference was held with the financial support of the CSSN in Tbilisi, Georgia on September 26.

Guliyev said Armenia has been organizing visits of foreign nationals including parliamentarians, to the occupied Azerbaijani territories in recent years.

He noted that Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry declares the violators persona non grata and include their names on a special list.

Unauthorized visits to Nagorno-Karabakh and other regions of Azerbaijan occupied by Armenia are considered illegal, and the individuals who pay such visits are included in Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry's "black list".

Earlier, Baku blacklisted the German MPs for their illegal visit to Azerbaijan's occupied territories.

The Foreign Ministry in 2013 released a list of 335 people declared 'persona non grata' over illegal visits to the Armenian-occupied territories. Some of these people were removed from the list after appealing to the Azerbaijani government.

"Unfortunately, among those included in the list, there are MPs from the member states countries of European Union, as well as members of the French delegation to PACE that violated Azerbaijani and international law. This is unacceptable. Especially, as co-chair of OSCE Minsk Group, France should prevent such actions, if it wants to act from the position of an independent, honest broker," Guliyev said.

He further noted that the individuals who illegally crossed the state border shall be criminally responsible in accordance with the Azerbaijani laws and the foreigners, who illegally visit Nagorno-Karabakh, should take it into account.

Along with the illegal visits to the occupied Azerbaijani territories, some foreign companies often get engaged in economic activities there, Guliyev added.

"This is another flagrant violation of international law. There is also evidence of sales in the EU member states of goods produced in the occupied territories of Azerbaijan, which is contrary to international law," Guliyev noted.

He went on to say that the only way out of the current deadlockis the liberation of the occupied Azerbaijani territories and the return of displaced persons to their homes.

Along with representatives of the UN, PACE and EU officials, the officials from Georgia, Moldova, Azerbaijan and other countries of the "Eastern Partnership" took part in the conference.

Azerbaijan has repeatedly warned foreign officials and diplomats about visits to its territories that are occupied by Armenia, calling it contradictory to international laws.

Baku has stated that such visits, paid without prior notification to the relevant authorities of Azerbaijan, are illegal and damage the settlement process of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

Armenia and Azerbaijan fought a lengthy war that ended with the signing of a fragile ceasefire in 1994. More than 20,000 Azerbaijanis were killed and over 1 million were displaced as a result of the large-scale hostilities. Since the war, Armenian armed forces have occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan's territory, including Nagorno-Karabakh and seven surrounding regions.

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