More than a week after the capitulation of the Armenian authorities, the exodus continues. And many refugees talk about the “cruelty” of this war.
Nagorno-Karabakh is emptying its inhabitants: in a few days, 88,780 people, or nearly three-quarters of the territory’s 120,000 official inhabitants, have left their homes, according to the latest count published by Yerevan, Friday September 29. The population fears reprisals after Azerbaijan’s victorious military offensive. In total, nearly 600 deaths were reported in the wake of Baku’s victorious military offensive, which led the separatists to capitulate on September 20.
>> Nagorno-Karabakh: “It is clear that this is ethnic cleansing”, denounces the ambassador of the Republic of Armenia to France
But, on site, the situation is unknown: the border is, in fact, only open in one direction: it is impossible to go to this enclave of Nagorno Karabakh. Guest of franceinfo, the Armenian ambassador to France spoke “ethnic cleansing in progress, in real time on social networks“, evoking “mass atrocities” seen on Azeri social networks. In the absence of international observers on site, this information is difficult to verify and contextualize. But certain elements exist: starting with the testimonies of these refugees who are fleeing Nagorno-Karabakh. They tell of burned houses and churches, the pain of a husband who died in combat, or even men who hide their military status, for fear of reprisals.
“War crimes”
Officially, Azerbaijan promises peace and calls on Armenians not to “leave their home“, also proposing to organize a UN visit to the site. However, the refugees do not believe it: they say that Baku does not want witnesses, speak of illegal arrests.
Decapitations and dismemberments are also mentioned. The horrors committed by Azerbaijani soldiers on Armenian soldiers are known. In 2020, during the previous war, Amnesty International investigated and published a detailed report: desecration of corpses, perversity, humiliations… “war crimes“, concluded the NGO, also perpetrated by the Armenian forces, against the soldiers of Baku.
So, is a genocide underway? “Yes, without a doubt“, concluded Luis Moreno Ocampo, former prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, this summer, relying on the blockade imposed by Azerbaijan, which effectively deprived the inhabitants of Nagorno-Karabakh of food. “Famine as an invisible weapon of genocide“, he wrote then.