JOINT STATEMENT OF NAGORNO KARABAKH YOUTH NGOS REGARDING THE US STATE

Azat Artsakh Daily
20 March 09
Republic of Nagorno Karabakh [NKR

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 18 March 2009, Stepanakert, NKR.