U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT REPORTS POLITICALLY BIASED AND UNTRUE

PanARMENIAN.Net
19.03.2009 18:44 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ US State Department’s reports remained politically
biased and partially inaccurate

Joint Statement of Nagorno Karabakh Youth NGOs criticized US State
Department’s 2008 Human Rights Reports on Armenia and Azerbaijan

On 25 February 2009 the US State Department’s Bureau of Democracy,
Human Rights, and Labor issued the 2008 Country Reports on Human Rights
Practices. As in previous years, these reports inter alia partially
cover the region of Caucasus, including Armenia and Azerbaijan. We
have read carefully these two country reports and made a number of
observations which are summarized in our joint statement.

In general, we welcome the US State Department’s attention to the
human rights situation worldwide, and the particular attention paid
to our region. We would encourage other governments, including those
of our region, to follow the example set by the United States in
mainstreaming human rights into their institutional practices and
reporting cycles. Government-produced reports, however, must be free
of political biases, partiality and preconceptions; otherwise they may
quickly lose their credibility and be seen by the public as yet another
instrument of unfair political pressure in international relations.

In this regard, it is very unfortunate that as in previous years,
the US State Department’s reports remained politically biased and
partially inaccurate. Instead of reporting on human rights situation
and violations per se, the reports on Armenia and Azerbaijan contain
a number of ambiguous political statements which demonstrate lack of
understanding of the causes and consequents of the disintegration of
the USSR, the independence of the Caucasian states and the conflict
in Nagorno-Karabakh. Both reports contain misleading statements that
"ethnic Armenian separatists […] continued to control most of the
Nagorno-Karabakh region"; these clauses entirely neglect the fact
that the so-called "Armenian separatists" are in fact the aboriginal
population of Nagorno-Karabakh, and what they "control" is in fact
their ancestral land and their right to live in their fatherland free
of the oppressive Azerbaijani regime.

Today many international independent human rights experts and
researchers accept the fact that Nagorno-Karabakh is far more
advanced in democracy, rule of law and human rights as compared to
Azerbaijan. Since the independence day, the people of Nagorno-Karabakh
have effectively exercised their right to elections and political
participation by freely electing three successive presidents. In
the meantime, the citizens of Azerbaijan were denied of similar
rights and were forced to vote in favor of the Aliyev clan in fake
elections that were largely seen as neither free nor fair. The
oppressive authoritarian state machinery of Azerbaijan can be no
match to the dynamically developing democratic institutions of
Nagorno-Karabakh. Moreover, extreme Armenophobia and propaganda
of hatred against Armenians became part of Azerbaijan’s state
policy. Hatred against Armenians in today’s Azerbaijan can be compared
to the anti-Semitic hysteria in the Nazi Reich and in some respects
exceeds the latter. The above-mentioned reports of the State Department
ignored these obvious significant disparities between the level of
democracy, rule of law and respect for human rights in Nagorno-Karabakh
and Azerbaijan.

The mentioned reports also failed to recognize today’s realities by
neglecting the existence of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, which
is one of the very few countries in Eastern Europe created in the
most democratic manner, i.e. through the popular referendum and by
the free will of people. The reports on Armenia and Azerbaijan keep
referring to Nagorno-Karabakh, as a "region of Azerbaijan", which is a
factual error. Nagorno-Karabakh was never a region of the independent
Azerbaijani state and in the past was forced under the jurisdiction
of Communist Azerbaijan by the criminal Stalinist regime. It is
very disturbing that human rights reports of a respectable state
institution second the Stalinist regime’s criminal legacy and
effectively overlook the 1988-1990 acts of genocide (in Sumgait,
Baku and Kirovabad) against Armenians in Azerbaijan, as well as the
consequences of the Azerbaijani aggression and the failed attempt to
commit a new genocide against the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Other factual errors in the two mentioned reports are also associated
with the consequences of the Azerbaijani aggression. The report on
Azerbaijan refers to the "IDPs", which is a factual error; most
of those referred to are in fact refugees. While mentioning the
Azerbaijani refugees, whose number totals at 500,000 to 600,000
(i.e. much less than the official Azerbaijani propaganda figures
disseminated around the world), the report neglects the Armenian
refugees from Azerbaijan and the IDPs from the Azerbaijani-occupied
Shahumian district of the NKR, whose combined number is at least
400,000. This may be seen as a clear manifestation of double
standards. The same report further mentions the "displaced Meskhetian
Turks… from the Lachin region controlled by Armenia-supported
Nagorno-Karabakh". It fails to clarify as to what business did the
"Meskhetian Turks" have in Nagorno-Karabakh – where they never lived
before – and who in fact were cynically abused by the Azerbaijani
leadership in an attempt to dramatically change the demographic
situation in the region. This reference is yet another proof that prior
to the conflict Azerbaijan was trying to conduct de-Armenization and
Turkification of the traditionally Armenian-populated Nagorno-Karabakh,
which in fact was one of the causes of the conflict.

The reports on Armenia and Azerbaijan also make ambiguous references,
which can be misleading for the uninformed readers. For example,
the report on Armenia states that "on June 17 and 18, two civilians
who were residents of the village of Chinari in the Tavush region
were shot by snipers while working in their fields; they died on
June 18." Uninformed readers could assume that these civilians were
shot at by Armenian snipers, which is not true; in fact the civilians
were targeted by the Azerbaijani snipers across the border, which in
itself is a violation of the cease-fire agreement by the Azerbaijani
side. Failure to specify this and similar facts makes the report
vague and in some respects useless, because the perpetrators of human
rights violations (in this case those violating the right to life)
do not feel any pressure to cease their criminal practices.

The report on Azerbaijan further states that "during the year shootings
along the militarized line of contact separating the sides as a result
of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict again resulted in numerous casualties
on both sides." While it is undeniable that the Armenian side sometimes
uses snipers in the cross-border shooting – which we certainly condemn
– any unbiased observer would confirm that such sniper shooting
incidents are much more frequently initiated by Azerbaijan. The same
stands for the number of abductions and disappearances; such actions
are mostly carried on by the Azerbaijani side.

We strongly believe that the outside attention to human rights record
and practices in Armenia, Nagorno-Karabakh and Azerbaijan can be an
important factor making the governments of these three states more
vigilant and sensitive to human rights. While reiterating that we
welcome in principle the US State Department’s reporting on human
rights situation in our region, we regret to see the repeated
political biases and factual inaccuracies in the latest reports,
which seriously undermine the value of these documents and make them
yet another failed opportunity to set the record straight and make
the United States seen as an objective observer and fair mediator.

Defenders of Homeland – Union of Freedom Fighters of Artsakh
Club of Young Political Scientists of Artsakh "Hayki Serund"
(Hayk’s Generation) Public Organization "Armenian Youth Club" Public
Organization Alpha and Omega Public Organization – Youth Branch Zephyr
Public Organization Democratic Party of Artsakh – Youth Branch