Azernews.Az

A draft resolution on the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict over Nagorno Karabakh proposed by some members of the Californian legislative body substantially distorts historical facts, is one-sided and seeks to prompt legislators to take a biased position on the issue, President of the Azerbaijani-American Council Ismayil Rustamov wrote in a letter to members of the legislative assembly.

The draft resolution was submitted by several members of the Californian legislative assembly on January 30, and it may be approved on February 27, the day when victims of alleged Armenian pogroms in the Azerbaijani cities of Sumgayit, Ganja and Baku in 1988-1990 will be remembered.

The resolution deliberately avoids mention of the Khojaly massacre of Azerbaijani civilians committed by Armenian armed forces during the Karabakh war in 1992, whose anniversary will be marked on February 26, Rustamov wrote.

According to Human Rights Watch, the killing of 613 civilians in Khojaly, including 106 women and 63 children, was the most massive massacre of civilians during the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict.

A petition condemning the resolution with more than 2,500 signatures, collected in two days, was attached to the letter sent to the congressmen.

The bill, introduced in the Californian assembly, describes the events in the separatist region of Azerbaijan, Nagorno Karabakh, in an astonishingly biased manner and only in terms of Armenian interests, the US Monterey Herald newspaper reports.

The bill does not mention that the Armenians killed 613 Azerbaijanis in the town of Khojaly four years after the so-called pogroms in 1988. Azerbaijanis have long been trying to draw international attention to those developments and inform the world community about them, the newspaper said.

"The question arises: why is the California assembly approaching the events of the Nagorno Karabakh conflict only in terms of recognition of the Armenian losses in this conflict and why now?" the author of the article asks.

In his opinion, the draft resolution reflects the overwhelming influence of the Armenian population of California. The document does not just seek to organize a day of remembrance, but is an attempt to use the tragic events as a political game surrounding the conflict.

The bill has sparked an angry response from Azerbaijanis in Washington and Los Angeles, the newspaper said.

"The legislature must remain impartial and find a peaceful solution, recognizing the views of both sides," the article says.

This story is published by AzerNEWS Weekly under a project funded by the Foundation for State Assistance to the Development of the Media under the President of the Azerbaijan Republic.