Azerbaijani MP urges monitoring cultural heritage in occupied territories
By Jamila Babayeva
An Azerbaijani MP urged the Council of Europe to monitor the current state of cultural heritage in the Armenian-occupied territories of Azerbaijan.
"A list of cultural monuments that exist in the occupied territories should be prepared first," Rafael Huseynov said at a meeting of the PACE committee on culture, science, education, and media on December 3.
"The document should show their current status. Then the Council of Europe should assist in implementing a special program aimed at preserving endangered cultural monuments," Azerbaijani parliamentary representative to the PACE underscored.
Over 350 cultural monuments, cemeteries, and mosques are left in the Azerbaijani lands occupied by Armenia.
Armenian armed forces have occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan since 1992, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts. Armenia constantly violates a ceasefire agreement signed with Azerbaijan in 1994 and refuses to implement the U.N. Security Council's four resolutions on the liberation of the Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding regions.
Huseynov noted that a part of Azerbaijan's cultural wealth is under seriously endangered in the occupied territories.
"Most of Azerbaijan's cultural wealth has been destroyed in Nagorno-Karabakh and seven surrounding regions occupied by Armenia for more than 20 years. In particular, patterns of intangible heritage, hundreds of stone monuments, and historical buildings are on the verge of extinction and destruction in these areas," Huseynov said during the discussions on the report called "Endangered European Cultural Heritage" by the Serbian MP Vesna Marianovich.
He said the Council of Europe regularly calls for the protection of cultural heritage, adding that certain steps are taken. "If we are sincere in our calls and efforts to protect cultural heritage, then we should also strive for the protection of not only cultural monuments in our own territory, but also cultural wealth which could have historical and cultural significance for the world, regardless of the people or country it belongs to."
Azerbaijan has taken important measures in this direction, which can be exemplary, Huseynov said. "We appreciate our own culture, as well as the cultural pearls of other nations that have universal importance. Through the Heydar Aliyev Foundation, Azerbaijan has participated in several important projects on the protection, repair and restoration of cultural monuments in the country and also foreign countries in the past few years. Azerbaijan intends to continue these activities."