28 years on, international recognition underway for Khojaly genocide

A mother holds her child killed by Armenian troops in Khojaly in February 1992. / Embassy of Azerbaijan

This article was contributed by the Embassy of Azerbaijan in Korea. ― ED.

The Khojaly genocide was a grave crime against the peaceful Azerbaijani people committed during Armenia's aggressive war against Azerbaijan.

The town of Khojaly is located in the Nagorno-Karabakh region of Azerbaijan in February. The strategic importance of Khojaly is related with its location at the crossroads of the main highways of the region, as well as having the only airport in the Nagorno-Karabakh. In the second half of February 1992, Khojaly was under total siege by Armenian military units and any attempts by local civilians to break the siege were prevented.

On the night of Feb. 25 to 26, 1992, in violation of all international legal norms, Armenian armed forces attacked the civilian population of the besieged town of Khojaly with heavy military equipment, killing with unprecedented brutality and razing the town to the ground.

As a result of this crime against not only the people of Azerbaijan, but against humanity, 613 civilians, including 63 children, 106 women and 70 elders were brutally murdered on grounds of national identity.

Khojaly villagers were beheaded, had their eyes gouged out, were skinned, and burned alive. Those trying to flee were killed with a particular brutality by Armenian troops who ambushed them on roads and in forests.

The Khojaly genocide was organized by the political and state leadership of the Republic of Armenia and was carried out by Armenian armed forces, Armenian terrorist groups in Nagorno-Karabakh and the former USSR army deployed in Khankandi.

Unlike the Nazis who tried to hide their crimes, the perpetuators of the Khojaly genocide justified and boasted of their barbarous criminal acts against civilian Azerbaijanis.

The words of former president of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan's, who was directly involved in the massacre, say it all. “Before Khojaly, the Azerbaijanis thought that the Armenians were people who could not raise their hand against the civilian population. We were able to break that stereotype.”

Back in those days, foreign news outlets such as “Sunday Times,” “Financial Times,” “Times,” “Izvestiya,” “Le Monde,” “Crual L'Eveneman” were publishing articles on horrific scenes witnessed in Khojaly.

The Times newspaper wrote on March 4, 1992: … “Many people were mutilated, and it was remained only the head of one little girl”.

Since 1994, the Parliament of the Republic of Azerbaijan has declared Feb. 26 as the Day of the Khojaly Genocide. Every year at 5 p.m. on Feb. 26, the people of Azerbaijan honor the memory of the Khojaly victims in a minute of silence.

The nature and gravity of the crimes committed in the town of Khojaly fully meets the definition of the word genocide as indicated in the Convention “On Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide” adopted on Dec. 9, 1948 under Resolution 260 (III) of the UN General Assembly. The premeditated massacre on this territory was committed with intent to annihilate residents solely on grounds that they were Azerbaijanis.

Khojaly does not differ from other horrifying tragedies of Katyn, Lidice, Oradour-sur-Glane, the Holocaust, Songmy, Rwanda and Srebrenica, which remain in history as deep and shameful scars.

Meanwhile, “Justice for Khojaly,” an International Awareness Campaign on the genocide, is being carried out in many countries and cities and plays an important role in the recognition of the Khojaly tragedy as an act of genocide.

In addition to several international organizations, the Parliaments of Mexico, Colombia, Peru, Pakistan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Romania, the Czech Republic, Sudan, Jordan, Honduras, Guatemala, Panama, Slovenia, Djibouti and Paraguay already recognized the massacre in Khojaly according to international legal norms.

Moreover, legislative bodies of 22 States of the USA, including Massachusetts, Texas, New-Jersey, Maine, New Mexico, Arkansas, Georgia, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Florida, Mississippi, West Virginia, Indiana, Utah, Nebraska, Hawaii, Montana, Arizona, Idaho and Nevada have adopted relevant resolutions.

On the eve of the 28th anniversary of the Khojaly genocide we once again urge all the states and international organizations to recognize this act of genocide in the name of justice and to consolidate and increase efforts for the punishment of its perpetrators.