Azernews.Az

By Ayya Lmahamad

Members of the Italian Senate have visited Azerbaijan’s liberated Aghdam city destroyed during three decades of the Armenian occupation, Azertag has reported.

During the visit on April 15, the delegation led by Standing Commission for External Affairs and Emigration Chairman Vito Petrocelly, were informed about Armenia’s war crimes and the destruction of Azerbaijan’s cultural, historical and religious monuments. They visited the destroyed Juma Mosque and the ruins of the Aghdam State Drama Theater.

The Italian delegation was accompanied by Azerbaijan-Italy working group on inter-parliamentary relations head Azer Karimli and other officials.

Aghdam, known as Hiroshimo of the Caucasus for the scale of its destruction, used to be among the largest and most developed cities not only in the Karabakh region but entire Azerbaijan before its occupation by Armenian in 1993.

During the years of occupation, Armenia razed to the ground, looted and burnt down houses, public buildings, schools, kindergartens, hospitals and industrial enterprises and even destroyed cemeteries.

President Ilham Aliyev on April 13 said that Armenia’s destruction of Azerbaijan’s formerly occupied territories is beyond Baku’s worst expectations.

Aghdam, along with Kalbajar and Lachin regions were returned to Azerbaijan in line with the November 10 peace deal signed between Baku, Yerevan and Moscow that obliged Armenia to withdraw its troops from the Azerbaijani lands that it had occupied since the early 1990s.

Before the signing of the peace deal, the Azerbaijani army had liberated over 300 settlements, villages, city centers and historic Shusha city from the Armenian occupation in the 44-day-war that lasted from September 27 to November 10.

Currently, the work is underway to restore Azerbaijan’s liberated territories. Azerbaijan will carry out the restoration and reconstruction work on its recently-liberated territories in four stages. The initial stage includes the solution of the issues of governance and security, infrastructure, while the subsequent stages include the solution of the issues of social services activities, reconstruction and development of the economy.

Azerbaijan has allocated AZN 2.2 billion ($1.3bn) for reconstruction works on the liberated territories in 2021. In particular, these funds will be used to restore the infrastructure (electricity, gas, water, communications, roads, education, health, etc), as well as cultural and historical monuments.

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Ayya Lmahamad is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @AyyaLmahamad

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