UNESCO offers to send mission to Nagorno-Karabakh

PanARMENIAN.Net - UNESCO has proposed sending a mission to Nagorno-Karabakh, amid fears of Azerbaijan's destruction of Armenian heritage.

The Director-General of the organization, Audrey Azoulay, met the representatives of Armenia and Azerbaijan on Wednesday, November 18.

The UNESCO chief recalled the statements made by the United Nations Secretary-General, who had expressed his relief and welcomed the agreement on a total ceasefire and cessation of hostilities in and around the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict zone.

Azoulay also reaffirmed the universal dimension of cultural heritage, as a witness to history and as inseparable from the identity of peoples, which the international community has a duty to protect and preserve for future generations, beyond the conflicts of the moment.

"The Director-General would like to recall the provisions of the 1954 Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict and its two Protocols, to which both Armenia and Azerbaijan are parties, and which are based on the States Parties’ conviction that "damage to cultural property belonging to any people whatsoever means damage to the cultural heritage of all mankind'," a statement on the organization's website reads.

The ancient Armenian monastery of Dadivank, the ruins and the archeological site of Tigranakert, Ghazanchetsots Cathedral in Shushi and hundreds of other historic monuments will be left to Azerbaijan, under a statement on the cessation of hostilities in Karabakh. At the moment, Russian peacekeepers have been deployed to the area near Dadivank to ensure the safety of both the church and the perishoners. Azerbaijanis, meanwhile, have already destroyed the domes of Saint John the Baptist Church in the city of Shushi, which has come under Azerbaijan's control in the recent war against Nagorno-Karabakh.

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, Russian and Azerbaijani Presidents Vladimir Putin and Ilham Aliyev have signed a statement to end the war in Karabakh after almost 45 days. Karabakh (Artsakh) President Arayik Harutyunyan has said he has agreed to the deal signed by Armenia, Russia and Azerbaijan.