Azernews.Az

Akbar Novruz

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At the Baku Military Court on August 21, survivor Rahila Hajiyeva delivered harrowing testimony about the atrocities she and her family endured during the Khojaly genocide in February 1992, Azernews reports.

Hajiyeva, who previously lived in Khankendi, said that escalating repression against Azerbaijanis in 1988 forced her family to move first to Shusha and later to Khojaly. It was there, she recalled, that they were taken hostage by Armenian armed forces.

“They beheaded my husband. They threw my ten-year-old daughter from the second floor, breaking her leg. They caused us a lot of suffering while we were held hostage,” Hajiyeva told the court.

She further recounted a particularly brutal incident involving another Azerbaijani family: “The pregnant daughter-in-law of a resident of Khankendi, Jalil, was cut open with a knife by soldiers of the Armenian armed forces and her baby was removed.”

The trial, which continues in Baku, concerns Armenian citizens accused of committing crimes against peace and humanity, including genocide, war crimes, terrorism, and other grave violations of international law during Armenia’s military aggression against Azerbaijan.