Azeri cultural appropriation campaign raised in letter to UN, UNESCO chiefs

PanARMENIAN.Net - President of the National Assembly of Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) Arthur Tovmasyan has raised Azerbaijan's continued campaign of cultural appropriation and explicit criminal intent to destroy Armenian cultural and religious monuments in Artsakh.

In a letter sent to UN Secretary General António Guterres, UNESCO Director-General Audrey Azoulay, the Personal Representative of the Chairperson-in-Office, Ambassador Andrzej Kasprzyk, and the World Council of Churches acting general secretary, Rev. Prof. Dr Ioan Sauca, Tovmasyan said Azerbaijan’s policy is a challenge to all humanity.

The letter comes after Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev visited the region of Hadrut in territories occupied by Azerbaijan and declared his intention to "renovate" a 12th century Armenian church, which he claimed was "an Albanian church". Aliyev went as far as to accuse Armenians of leaving "fake inscriptions" in the Armenian language. Azerbaijanis also claim Armenians are artificially remoulding the monasteries.

"The statements made by Azerbaijan's top authorities on replanning and coercive remoulding of the Armenian apostolic churches with the far-reaching aim of their “albanization”, on erasing Armenian inscriptions, are reprehensible. Azerbaijan is thereby true to its modus operandi of historical revisionism, fabrication of history, legitimization of its presence in the occupied territories of the Artsakh Republic and strengthening its ties to these lands," Tovmasyan said.

"It is obvious that these carefully planned institutionalized attacks and aggressive campaign by Azerbaijan on Armenian cultural and religious property, pursued with flagrant violation of treaty and customary international humanitarian law, are aimed at eradicating Armenian people’s historical roots to the region, destroying historical records of their self-definition, dismantling the Armenian cultural capacity, obliterating the Armenian identity, as well as appropriating the Armenian cultural and religious heritage."

As opposed to the policy of extermination of the Armenian cultural and religious heritage adopted by the Azerbaijani authorities, Tovmasyan said, the Republic of Artsakh has always remained committed to promoting ethnic and religious tolerance in its territory. The restoration of Gohar Agha Upper Mosque in Shushi in 2019 is a clear example and ample proof of it, he aded.

"The relevant entities of the Republic of Artsakh and Republic of Armenia have time and again raised serious concern over the systematic and deliberate destruction and appropriation cases by Azerbaijan of the Armenian cultural and religious heritage based on open-source data," the official said.

Tovmasyan also reaffirmed the Armenian side's readiness to facilitate the UNESCO fact-finding mission to the region, urging the organizations to go beyond statements of concern and take practical steps to prevent the intentional destruction of Armenian cultural and religious heritage pursued by Azerbaijan.

Concerns about the preservation of cultural sites in Nagorno-Karabakh are made all the more urgent by the Azerbaijani government’s history of systemically destroying indigenous Armenian heritage—acts of both warfare and historical revisionism. The Azerbaijani government has secretly destroyed a striking number of cultural and religious artifacts in the late 20th century. Within Nakhichevan alone, a historically Armenian enclave in Azerbaijan, Azerbaijani forces destroyed at least 89 medieval churches, 5,840 khachkars (Armenian cross stones) and 22,000 historical tombstones between 1997 and 2006.