Azeri democracy: "historic truth" at a bargain

Azeri democracy:

PanARMENIAN.Net - Several days ago, Alberta Azerbaijani Cultural Society planted a tree in a park of Calgary, Canada, with a plaque at the bottom of it commemorating the victims of so-called “Khojaly Tragedy.” Also, a bench, carrying an identical plaque, was installed in the park.

However, according to Armenian media, the Calgary municipal authorities disallowed the anti-Armenian accusatory inscription from appearing on the plaques, with the latters simply reading “Khojaly Tragedy.”

As might be expected, the move drew fervent response among the country’s media, which hurried to dub it a victory of Azeri diplomacy.

In reality, though, the bench and the tree fall short of signaling the triumph of Azeri diplomacy – it’s much simpler: the items are a part of social program made available for private persons as well as organizations for $3500 and $500-$800 respectively. Thus, “the victory of Azeri democracy” came at a ballpark price of $4000.

Azeri propaganda continues misleading the international community and its own people by falsifying the essence and the history of the Nagorno Karabakh conflict: Baku’s sparing no money in spreading propagandist literature, releasing fake documents and photos to impose its version of the Khojalu events.

It’s public knowledge that Azeri ex-president Ayaz Mutalibov accused his political opponents with murders in Khojalu. In an interview, he stated, “Why would Armenians need to open fire after leaving a humanitarian corridor for people to escape - especially on the territory of Aghdam, where help was easily accessible. As Khojaly survivors assert, the move was orchestrated to prompt my resignation, by forces aiming to discredit the president.”

Much later, Azerbaijani journalist and human rights activist Eynulla Fatullayev said, “several years ago I met some refugees from Khojaly, temporarily settled in Naftalan, who openly confessed to me that, on the eve of the large-scale offensive of the Russian and Armenian troops on Khojaly, the town had been encircled [by those troops]. And even several days prior to the attack, the Armenians had been continuously warning the population about the planned operation through loudspeakers and suggesting that the civilians abandon the town and escape from the encirclement through a humanitarian corridor along the Karkar River. According to the Khojaly refugees’ own words, they had used this corridor and, indeed, the Armenian soldiers positioned behind the corridor had not opened fire on them…

Having crossed the area behind the Karkar River, the row of refugees was separated and, for some reason, a group of [them] headed in the direction of Nakhichevanik. It appears that the National Front Army battalions were striving not for the liberation of the Khojaly civilians but for more bloodshed on their way to overthrow A. Mutalibov [the first President of Azerbaijan] …”

So the bitter truth is: no amount of plaques and benches will make the international community believe in the Azeri-generated “Khojaly genocide” myth, no matter how much Baku is willing to splurge to show itself in a good light.

Marina Ananikyan/ PanARMENIAN.Net, Photo: Vesti.az
Military operation in Khojalu

The events in Khojalu, which led to the deaths of civilians, were the result solely of political intrigues and power struggle in Azerbaijan. The real reasons are most convincingly reflected in the accounts of Azerbaijanis themselves — as participants in and eyewitnesses of what happened — as well as of those who know the whole inside story of the events in Baku. Khojalu, along with Shushi and Agdam, was one of the main strongholds from which Stepanakert, the capital of the Nagorno Karabakh Republic, was shelled continuously and mercilessly for the three winter months of 1991/92 with artillery, missiles and launchers used for targeting cities. Knocking out the weapon emplacements in Khojalu and thus freeing the airport were the only way for the Nagorno Karabakh Republic to ensure the physical survival of its population condemned by Azerbaijan to complete annihilation. The daily shelling of Stepanakert from nearby Khojalu took the lives of hundreds of peaceful inhabitants — women, children and old people.

Then-President of Azerbaijan, Ayaz Mutalibov, has stated that “the assault on Khojaly was not a surprise attack”. In an interview in 1992 with the Russian newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta he emphasized that “a corridor was kept open by the Armenians for people to leave”. However, a column of civilians was fired on by armed units of the Popular Front of Azerbaijan on the approaches to the Agdam district border, a fact later confirmed by Ayaz Mutalibov, who linked this criminal act to attempts by the opposition to remove him from power, and blamed it entirely for what happened. In his interview with the Russian magazine, Novoye Vremya, Mutalibov stated that “the shooting of the Khojalu residents was obviously organized by someone to take control in Azerbaijan”.

According to Azerbaijani journalist M. Safarogly, “Khojalu occupied an important strategic position. The loss of Khojalu was a political fiasco for Mutalibov”.

Furthermore, there is a statement by an Azerbaijani journalist, Arif Yunusov, which clearly states: “The town and its inhabitants were deliberately sacrificed for a political purpose — to prevent the Popular Front of Azerbaijan from coming to power”. In this case, though, the Azerbaijanis themselves are named as the perpetrators of the tragedy.

It is already obvious for everybody that the «genocide» of Azerbaijanis in Khojalu is a myth created still by Heydar Aliyev and taken up by his throne-successor, Aliyev-junior, in order to draw the international community's attention away from the massacre of Armenians in Sumgait, Baku, Kirovabad, and many other populated-by-Armenians settlements, as well as to conceal the political, humanitarian, military, economic, and other penal offences of the Azerbaijani leadership against Armenian civilians and against its own people.

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