By Trend

The Committee on Foreign Relations and Inter-Parliamentary Relations of the Azerbaijani Parliament has made a statement on the resolution of the European Parliament dated March 10, 2022, the press and public relations department of the parliament told Trend.

According to the statement, on March 10, the European Parliament adopted another resolution biased against Azerbaijan.

The statement noted that this resolution, based on the absolutely false information of Armenia and the Armenian lobby in the European Parliament, regarding the 30-year occupation of Azerbaijani lands [until their liberation in the 2020 second Karabakh war], including the facts of vandalism committed on these lands against Azerbaijan’s cultural heritage, calling into question its territorial integrity and sovereignty, and undermining efforts aimed at ensuring long-term peace and stability in the region, simultaneously including a number of dangerous moments, also casts a shadow on the efforts of mankind to eliminate religious, racial discrimination and intolerance.

This resolution, aimed at misleading the international community, can definitely be called the next decline of European democracy, the statement stressed.

"The negligence and indifference of the European Parliament to universal human values raise serious questions. The resolution of the European Parliament completely denies the vandalism committed by Armenia during the 30-year occupation against the cultural heritage of Azerbaijan. The period of occupation was accompanied by war crimes and crimes of Armenia against humanity,” the statement further said. “Along with deliberate destruction of cities and villages, Armenia annihilated the entire cultural heritage of the Azerbaijani people in these territories. Numerous historical, cultural and religious monuments, archaeological sites, libraries and museums, museum exhibits, unique manuscripts, cemeteries were systematically ruined and looted.”

“Mosques were razed to the ground or turned into places for keeping cows and pigs, desecrating them. Vandalism was committed not only against monuments belonging to the Islamic religion. Albanian and Christian churches were also destroyed, an attempt was made to Armenize them by making architectural changes," the statement pointed out.

The statement emphasized that despite the numerous appeals of Azerbaijan, Armenia prevented the visits of UNESCO missions and other specialized international structures to the previously occupied territories to assess the state of cultural heritage. The indecisiveness of international structures encouraged Armenia to further expand the scale of destructions.

"The fact is notable that the European Parliament, which repeatedly refers to UNESCO in its resolution, but at the same time denies these facts and accuses Azerbaijan of obstructing the mission of this organization, over the past years has never raised the issue of the consequences of the Azerbaijani territories' occupation by Armenia, the vandalism committed against its cultural heritage,” the statement said. “The current resolution of the European Parliament contradicts not only the principles of international humanitarian law, but also the principles adopted by the European Union itself against the destruction of cultural and religious monuments.”

“It’s also necessary to emphasize the fact that as a result of the meeting held on February 4 this year in a video format with the participation of the President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev, President Emmanuel Macron as the French Presidency of the European Union, President of the Council of the EU Charles Michel and Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan, consent was expressed to sending a UNESCO mission to Azerbaijan and Armenia,” the statement reminded.

“This confirms the need to study the state of cultural heritage in the territory of Armenia, which belongs to the Azerbaijani people. For some reason, the European Parliament doesn’t touch upon this issue at all. The European Parliament presents cultural monuments which, as it claims, belong to Armenians as part of the ancient Christian and common heritage of mankind,” the statement noted.

“The way of thinking denying the destruction and serious damage of 67 mosques, and razing monuments of Islamic culture to the ground during the occupation, encouraging religious and racial discrimination, indulges extremely dangerous tendencies. In general, the resolution doesn’t mention the cultural heritage of Azerbaijan. The resolution also distorts the essence of the International Court of Justice decision (December 2021) with reference to lawsuits filed by Armenia, which were rejected by the court,” the statement pointed out.

“In general, this resolution of the European Parliament contradicts the efforts of goodwill that the EU leadership has been demonstrating lately in the matter of ensuring peace, stability and security in the South Caucasus,” the statement further said. “Temples of all religions, all cultural monuments on the territory of Azerbaijan are protected and restored by the state. This resolution of the European Parliament is just a piece of paper, and it cannot cast a shadow on the high national, spiritual and cultural values of the Azerbaijani people.”

“The Parliament of Azerbaijan strongly condemns the attempt made by the European Parliament to spread biased false information and calls for refraining from provocations that could disrupt the normalization process in the region," concluded the statement.