Azerbaijan Calls for Joint Action to Solve Refugee, IDP Issues

Tackling issues of migration and refugees will require joint action, said Khalaf Khalafov, Deputy Foreign Minister of Azerbaijan, at an event organized by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) in Baku on March 15.

At the event, titled “Migration, Refugees and Displaced Persons,” Khalafov identified these problems as a threat to international security and borders, saying such issues contribute to the formation of separatist regimes. 

Khalafov said Azerbaijan developed a Great Repatriation (Great Return) draft program to facilitate the return of refugees and internally displaced persons, or IDPs, after occupied Azerbaijani lands were freed from Armenia’s illegal control during the still unresolved Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

PACE is the parliamentary arm of the Council of Europe, a 47-nation international organization dedicated to upholding human rights, democracy and the rule of law. 

Valeh Alasgarov, the Azerbaijani parliament’s Vice-Speaker, said Azerbaijan faces a grave problem with refugees and IDPs due to Armenia’s continuous occupation of what amounts to 20 percent of Azerbaijan’s land. Alasgarov accused the international community of applying double standards in regards to Armenia’s aggression against Azerbaijan.

“We don’t complain, we only urge the international organizations to show a more fair, constructive and resolute approach to the Armenian-Azerbaijani Nagorno-Karabakh conflict,” he said.

Azerbaijan and Armenia, two post-Soviet nations in the South Caucasus region, went through a bloody war in the early 1990s that resulted in Armenia forcibly occupying more than 20 percent of Azerbaijan’s internal and internationally recognized lands. While the war officially ended in a ceasefire agreement signed between the two sides in 1994, de facto elimination of mutual military hassle has been failing, as Armenia continues to occupy the lands with military personnel, who routinely violate the ceasefire.