14:10, 15 August 2023
YEREVAN, AUGUST 16, ARMENPRESS. The NGOs representing the interests of forcibly displaced Armenians from Nakhijevan have issued a statement in response to the false narrative circulated by certain Azerbaijani circles alleging that Nakhijevan is blockaded by Armenia.
Below is the full statement:
“The false narrative circulated by certain Azerbaijani circles claiming that Nakhijevan is blockaded by the Republic of Armenia aims to conceal the fact that Azerbaijan itself has been blockading Armenia since the beginning of the 1990s, with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev having numerously announced its intentional nature.
The policy of blockade has been the priority of Azerbaijan itself for the past 30 years. With this purpose, not only has Azerbaijan blocked the Armenia-Azerbaijan railway which functioned in Soviet years, which included the Ijevan-Ghazakh, Meghri-Horadiz, Meghri-Ordubad, Yeraskh-Sadarak directions, all automobile highways linking Armenia-Azerbaijan, but has also consistently pushed Armenia out of economic projects of regional significance. In the 1990s, Azerbaijan also shut down the gas pipeline spanning from Azerbaijan to Armenia, causing an energy crisis for Armenia.
Nakhijevan cannot be blockaded by Armenia for the simple reason that it is not an enclave within the borders of a state, but has the opportunity to interact with Azerbaijan and the outside world by land through Iran and Turkey. Besides the land connection, an uninterrupted air communication functions between Nakhijevan and Azerbaijan, also through the airspace of the Republic of Armenia in at least the past three years. The interruption of communication of Nakhijevan and the rest of the Azerbaijan Republic is due to the Azerbaijani policy of blockading the Republic of Armenia. The fact that the connection routes are blocked not by Armenia but by Azerbaijan is proven with the fact that from January 2023 alone 1,407 transit flights from Azerbaijan to Nakhijevan and in the opposite direction were carried out through Armenian airspace.
The Armenian side has attached great importance and numerously expressed readiness in the issue of unblocking regional connection routes. Moreover, a government draft decision on amending the 2011, May 12, N 703 government decision has been in circulation since August 18, 2022, regarding the opening of three checkpoints on the Armenian-Azerbaijani state border and unblocking of regional communications, which Azerbaijan has been opposing by not agreeing to open the respective checkpoints on its territory. In case of the Azerbaijani government’s consent, Nakhijevan would have automobile connection with Azerbaijan through the territory of the Republic of Armenia.
On December 14, 2021, during the meeting of Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and President of the European Council Charles Michel, an agreement was reached on the unblocking of railway infrastructures and restoration of railway. Azerbaijan later abandoned this agreement.
We also note that due to the closed borders and Azerbaijan’s Armenophobic policy the Armenians of Nakhijevan are deprived of their right of return to their ancestral settlements.”
