Foreign media
The well-known "Euractiv" portal published an article by Hikmet Hajiyev, Assistant to the President of Azerbaijan - Head of the Foreign Policy Department of the Presidential Administration Hikmet Hajiyev titled "Attacks by Armenia against Azerbaijani civilians and critical infrastructure should not be overlooked."
“On 27 September, less than three months after the Tovuz escalation of July, the armed forces of Armenia launched another military attack against Azerbaijan. Azerbaijani Army was compelled to take counter-offensive measures to deter the aggression and to protect its citizens.
This has re-ignited the thirty-year-old territorial conflict between the two countries which has remained unresolved due to the disregard of the Armenian government for the four UN Security Council resolutions (822, 853, 874, and 884) adopted in 1993 that call for an immediate, complete and unconditional withdrawal of armed forces of Armenia from the Nagorno-Karabakh region and other seven occupied districts of Azerbaijan,” the article informs the readers.
“Armenia’s behavior over the past few weeks since the outbreak of the hostilities has once again testified to its unwillingness to comply with the resolutions of the UN Security Council.
Quite the contrary, the incumbent leadership of Armenia has further ratcheted up its militaristic and hostile rhetoric and made new provocations towards the Azerbaijani side.
In the course of its counter-offensive operation since 27 September, Azerbaijan succeeded in liberating a part of its occupied territories.
From the beginning of the hostilities, Azerbaijan has set it upright that its targets are not civilians, but only legitimate military objects and combatants, under international humanitarian law, the provisions of the Geneva Conventions of 1949,” Hikmet Hajiyev noted.
“Confident battleground gains by the armed forces of Azerbaijan have caused a sense of misdirection to the military and political leadership of Armenia, and they started to attack deliberately densely populated Azerbaijani cities and villages well beyond the theatre of military hostilities.
The Azerbaijani cities neighboring the frontline, primarily, Barda, Tartar, Beylagan, Agdam, Fuzuli, Goranboy, Shamkir, and Naftalan, are being continuously shelled by the Armenian armed forces often from the territory of Armenia.
Armenia also hit Azerbaijan’s Khizi and Absheron region in the neighborhood of the capital city of Baku with two 300 km mid-range missiles,“ Hikmet Hajiyev informed the readers.
The article reads: “On 11 October, Armenia launched “SCUD” ballistic missile from its territory to a residential area in Ganja, the second largest city of Azerbaijan that is located more than 60 km away from the frontline. The fact that there is not any military installation in the vicinity of the targeted area which could justify the attack gives ground to characterise it as a war crime. The attack at midnight destroyed the apartment building killed 10 civilians in their sleep and injured 34. One of the most tragic results of the attack was about a two-year-old child who lost both parents.
As of 14 October, 43 Azerbaijani civilians have been killed and 214 civilians were wounded in the course of these attacks against the settlements. 277 civilian facilities and 1571 houses and buildings have been destroyed. Even hospitals, medical facilities, ambulances, schools, and kindergartens are not spared.
The attacks against the civilian settlements serve Armenia’s goal to terrorize the Azerbaijani public and disseminate fear among the civilian population. This is also an attempt to expand the theatre of military hostilities and as such to distract Azerbaijan from its peace enforcement operations.”
Moreover, by striking the densely populated cities from Armenia’s territory, the government of Armenia hopes to provoke Azerbaijan for a counter-strike, thus effectively making a case for dragging the third parties – namely the Collective Security Treaty Organization – into its adventures.
In addition to the civilian population, Armenia also targets Azerbaijan’s critical energy infrastructure, and oil and gas pipelines that possess strategic political and economic importance for Azerbaijan and its international partners as well as for the energy security of the wider continent.