The armed aggression of the Republic of Armenia against the Azerbaijani Republic pursuant to its policy of violent acquisition of territory and its plans to establish a "Greater Armenia" has resulted in gross and flagrant violations of human rights which fall within the category of crimes against humanity. The armed hostilities against Azerbaijan were preceded by anti-constitutional actions in the Nagorny Karabakh region of Azerbaijan perpetrated by separatist groups receiving outside support; forming the backdrop these actions were certain decisions taken by the Armenian authorities in contravention of international law. Of these decisions, the most notorious is the resolution "Reunification of the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic and Nagorny Karabakh" adopted by the Armenian Parliament on 1 December 1989. Moreover, in Armenia's declaration of sovereignty of 23 August 1990, part of the territory of another State- the Nagorny Karabakh region of Azerbaijan- is recognized as an integral part of the Republic of Armenia. These decisions by the Armenian Parliament were enacted by its armed forces with the widespread use of mercenary bands and a sudden upsurge in terrorist activity by the Armenian special services and terrorist organizations against sovereign Azerbaijan with a view to wresting away part of its age-old lands. All-out hostilities began at the end of 1991 and the start of 1992 when Armenian armed formations initiated combat operations in the Nagorny Karabakh region of Azerbaijan using the very latest weapons systems. Since May, 1992 their armed forces have made incursions beyond the borders of the former Nagorny Karabakh Autonomous Region into other parts of the country.

As a result of more than eight years of war, approximately 20 per cent of the entire territory of Azerbaijan, comprising Nagorny Karabakh and an area four times bigger than that region, has been occupied and held by the Armenian armed forces. .

A chronological list of the seizure of Azerbaijani towns and districts follows:
28 February 1992 - Khojaly
8 May 1992 - Shusha
18 May 1992 - Lachin
3 April 1993 - Kelbajar
28 June 1993- Agdere
23 July 1993 - Agdam
23 August 1993 Fizuli
26 August 1993 - Djebrail
30 September 1993 - Kubatly
28 October 1993 - Zangelan and Goradiz

It should be noted in particular that the Agdere and Aguam districts ot Azerbaijan were seized by Armenian armed forces following the adoption of Security Council resolution 822 (1993) of 30 April 1993.. which condemned the occupation of the Kelbajar district; the Fizuli district was seized after the adoption of Security Council resolution 853 (1993) of 29 July 1993 condemning the seizure of the Agdam district; and the Djebrail and Kubatly districts were seized after the adoption of Security Council resolution 874 (1993) of 14 October 1993. In its resolution 884 (1993) of 11 November 1993. the Council condemned the occupation of the Zangelan district and the city of Goradiz, attacks on civilians and bombardments of the territory of the Azerbaijani Republic. In all the above-mentioned resolutions, the Council underscored respect for the sovereignty, territorial integrity and inviolability of the borders of the Azerbaijani Republic, and the inadmissibility of using force to acquire territory.' "It also demanded the immediate cessation of armed hostilities and hostile acts, and the immediate, full and unconditional withdrawal of all occupying forces from the occupied areas of Azerbaijan. Despite the unequivocal demands of the Security Council, the Republic of Armenia is today still holding on to occupied Azerbaijani territory and increasing its military presence there.

As a result of the aggression and ethnic cleansing of Azerbaijanis from the territory of Armenia proper and from the occupied part of the territory of Azerbaijan, there are currently over 1 million refugees and displaced persons in Azerbaijan. A total of 900 settlements have been looted and destroyed. Over 9 million square metres of civilian housing, state enterprises and social facilities have been destroyed and burnt. The total cost of the destroyed housing and the property removed therefrom amounts to tens of billions of dollars. An extremely serious humanitarian situation has developed in Azerbaijan.

Every year hundreds of elderly people, women and children die in refugee camps as a result of diseases and epidemics.

The Armenian armed forces, backed by mercenary formations and Armenian terrorist groups, have killed over 18,000 people and wounded or maimed over 50,000. Several thousand people are missing and extrajudicial executions and mass shootings of civilians have been carried out. Kidnapped hostages held in Armenia and the occupied areas of Azerbaijan are doing forced labour and being made to endure inhumane treatment, beatings, torture and other gross violations of their human rights.

According to information from the State Commission of the Azerbaijani Republic on prisoners of war. hostages and missing persons, as a result of Armenian aggression these categories comprised 4.674 Azerbaijani citizens as 1 March 1996. This total includes 314 women. 60 children and 252 elderly people (lists of missing women, children and elderly people are attached). The State Commission knows the whereabouts of over 900 of these people, including 39' women. 12 children and 39 elderly people, in the territory of the Republic of Armenia and the occupied Azerbaijani territories. The vast majority of them are being detained by the Armenian side without the knowledge of the International Committee of The Red Cross (ICRC), and therefore do not appear on that organization's lists.

The hostages and prisoners of war held by the Armenians, many of whom are considered missing persons since they are being concealed from the ICRC, are forced to do heavy physical labour, subjected to beatings and torture, and the sick and wounded are denied basic medical assistance. The State Commission has learnt that 145 Azerbaijanis have died in Armenian captivity. Four people, who endured indescribable degradation and suffering. died shortly after being released.

Ethnic cleansing of Armenian territory of Its Azerbaijani inhabitants

The widespread settlement of Transcaucasia by Armenians began after tsarist Russia's military conquest of the Caucasus. Taking advantage of the changed demographic situation, the Armenians, under the tutelage of the rulers of tsarist Russia and, later, the communist leaders of the Soviet Union, encroached on the native Azerbaijani population in various parts of the region.

It is a matter of historical fact that in 1828-1829 alone, 130.000 Armenians were resettled out of Middle Eastern countries into the area now forming the Republic of Armenia; another 600,000 were resettled later.

By 1918, the number of Azerbaijanis in what is now Armenia stood at 575,000 - more than a third of all the inhabitants of the area. But as a result of the Armenian Government's deliberate policy of expelling the Azerbaijani population, there remains today in Armenia not a single Azerbaijani out of that half-million-strong community.

Between December 1917 and the end of June 1918, Armenian army units plundered and burnt 200 Azerbaijani villages in Erevan province. The surviving inhabitants fled to the mountains, where they died of cold and starvation. Over that period, Armenian troops occupied the whole of the Surmalin district and parts of the Erevan, Echmiadzin and Sharur districts, which they purged of Azerbaijanis by force of arms.

Throughout Armenia between 1918 and 1920, Azerbaijanis were subjected to violence of unimaginable savagery. Sixty Azerbaijani villages were destroyed and all their male inhabitants killed in the districts of Igdir and Echmiadzin; in Geichin province, 22 villages were destroyed and 60,000 inhabitants killed; in Yeni Bayazid, 84 villages and 15.000 homes were destroyed. Over the summer and autumn of 1918, 115 Azerbaijani villages and hamlets in the district of Zangezur were destroyed; 7.729 Azerbaijanis were brutally murdered - 3.257 men. 2.276 women and 2.196 children.

Forced deportations and mass killings of the peaceable Azerbaijani population continued into 1920. The remnants of the Azerbaijani population in,Erevan province and the Zangezur and Echmiadzin districts were driven out or annihilated, and their villages ploughed into the ground.

Research has shown that around 2 million Azerbaijanis and members of other ethnic groups were killed, wounded or forcibly expelled over this period.

One of the leading figures in the Kremlin. A. Mikoyan. played a major role in the execution of the Armenian nationalists' plans for the ethnic cleansing of Armenia. Making use of his influence oxer Stalin, he secured the signature of the “little father of the peoples" on decrees by the Council of Ministers of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics No. 4083 of 23 December 1947. "Resettlement of collective farmers and other Azerbaijani inhabitants from the Armenian SSR to the Kur-Arax Depression in the Azerbaijani SSR", and No. 754 of 10 March 1948, "Action to resettle collective farmers and other Azerbaijani inhabitants from, the Armenian SSR to the Kur-Arax Depression in the Azerbaijani SSR". Under these decrees, during the period 1948-1951 more than 100.000 Azerbaijanis were forcibly resettled from their historical homelands - the mountainous regions of Armenia - to the then waterless steppes of Mugan and the Mil plateau. Many of them could not withstand the ordeal and perished.

The forcing of the Azerbaijanis out of Armenia was accompanied by flagrant' discrimination in breach of their constitutional rights and a refusal to cater to their national and cultural interests. Hundreds of thousands of the Azerbaijanis who remained in Armenia until 1988, surviving as compact groups, displayed none of the hallmarks even of national cultural autonomy. Attempts to so much as mention this were promptly, roughly and savagely suppressed. In essence, access for Azerbaijanis in Armenia to employment in state entities was barred.

In the winter of 1988, a fresh bout of ethnic cleansing began as the culmination of a deliberate policy to destroy all trace of the very existence o Azerbaijanis in Armenia. Under instructions from, and with the blessing of, the Armenian authorities, the remaining 40,897 Azerbaijani families (185.519 individuals) were forcibly deported from their historical homelands within the present-day Armenian State, and left without homes or belongings.

The mass expulsion was accompanied by killings and maimings. In the space of just three days, from 27 to 29 November 1988, pogroms in the Armenian towns of Gugark, Spitak and Stepanavan killed 33 Azerbaijanis.

In all, according; to figures from the State Prosecutor's Office of the Azerbaijani Republic, 216 Azerbaijanis died during the ethnic cleansing in Armenian territory in 1988-1989; 49 froze to death, seeking safety from reprisals in the mountains; 41 died of savage beatings; 35 were killed after torture; 115 were burnt alive; 16 were shot; 10, unable to endure the humiliation, died of heart attacks; 2 were killed right in hospital by their Armenian doctors; 3 were drowned; 1 was hanged; 1. not wishing to die an agonizing death, took his own life; 1 was electrocuted; 2 were beheaded; 29 were deliberately run over; 3 died in hospital because they were not given medical attention; and a further 8 were abducted and vanished without trace.

The majority of the dead were children, women and elderly people. They included 5 infants and 18 children of various ages. Seven-year-old Zokhra Nabieva was burnt alive. Three-year-old Rakhman Mamedov was not given the doctor`s attention he needed and subsqnently died. Seven children froze to death, two died after sax-ace beatings, two were shot. Elman Aliev, three years old suffered a heart attack. Six were unable to withstand brutal torture and died; three were run over.

Fifty-seven Azerbaijani women came to a tragic end on Armenian soil. Seven were beaten to death, five froze, four died under torture, three of heart attacks, two under the wheels of cars; one was decapitated, one was drowned, one was burnt, two died of gunshot wounds for which they did not receive the necessary medical attention, and one was killed by doctors in hospital. The remainder disappeared without trace and are probably dead, given than there has been no news of them for a long time now.

Sixty elderly Azerbaijanis (over 60 years of age) also died during their expulsion from Armenia, among them 20 women. In most cases their deaths resulted from torture, bullet wounds, heart attacks, beatings and frostbite. Gyulsum Aliev, aged 76, Khanum Iskenderov, aged 73, Mekhrali Aliev, aged 68, Garib Bairamov, aged 67 and Leila Huseinova, aged 63, were burnt. A doctor killed Hasan Ellazov, aged 68, in hospital. The most widespread atrocities occurred in the Gukar district, where 22 Azerbaijanis lost their lives, 13 of them being burnt to death. Crimes against the Azerbaijani population were also committed in the Kalinin, Goris, Stepanavan, Vardenis, Masis, Spitak, Ararat, Kirovakan, Ijevan, Krasnoselsk, Ekhegnadzor, Amasia, Kafan, Abovyan, Sevan and Noyemberian districts of Armenia.

Virtually all the attacks on Azerbaijani settlements had the blessing of the official Armenian authorities and were commanded by local leaders and responsible figures or by members of the local law-enforcement bodies. During the forcible expulsion of the Azerbaijanis, hundreds of historical relics testifying to the fact that Azerbaijanis had for centuries belonged on the land in what is today Armenia were either destroyed or altered to look Armenian. Islamic places of worship and the graves in Azerbaijani cemeteries were defiled; mosques and tombs were damaged or broken up for building materials.

To erase from history the fact that Azerbaijanis had lived in Armenia, the names of some 2,000 towns and villages that formerly bore Azerbaijani names have been changed; 465 villages were renamed between 1935 and 1973 and 97 in April 1991.

The concluding, tragic chord had been played in a meticulously planned campaign of physical extermination of the Azerbaijanis, once the most populous of the national minorities in the Republic of Armenia.