Karabakh Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh have received humanitarian aid for the first time since Azerbaijan’s attack on the enclave began. That writes Reuters news agency. A Red Cross aid convoy arrived on Saturday with about seventy thousand kilos of humanitarian aid. Russia is also said to have supplied at least fifty thousand kilos of food and other aid.
According to leaders of the Karabakh Armenians, the electricity grid in the area that was paralyzed by the offensive will be restored this weekend. Nearly twenty people injured in the fighting have been evacuated from the area. Thousands of people who have fled their villages because of the violence are sleeping in the open air and in tents in the capital Stepanakert, reports the BBC.
Meanwhile, Azerbaijan continues what the government calls the “demilitarization” of Nagorno-Karabakh. Separatist fighters in the area must surrender their weapons to Azerbaijan under the terms of the shaky ceasefire. At least eight hundred rifles and six armored vehicles are said to have been surrendered by now.
Armenia calls on UN to monitor
To ensure that human rights in the enclave are not violated by Azerbaijan, the United Nations must monitor Nagorno-Karabakh. Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan called for this in a speech to the UN General Assembly. “After the failure to prevent genocide in Rwanda, the United Nations succeeded in creating mechanisms for prevention, making it ‘never again’ became a meaningful promise,” Mirzoyan said. “But now we are on the eve of a new failure.”
Jeyhun Bayramov, Azerbaijan’s Foreign Minister, reiterated in a speech to the UN Security Council that the Karabakh Armenians are not at risk. “I would like to reiterate Azerbaijan’s determination to reintegrate the ethnic Armenian residents of the Karabakh region into Azerbaijan as equal citizens,” Baymarov said.
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US expresses concerns
The United States is calling for an international observation mission. A US Congressional delegation visited the border between Armenia and Azerbaijan on Saturday. U.S. Senator Gary Peters, who led the delegation, said he shared the concerns of Karabakh Armenians about their future. “The world needs to know what is happening there,” Peters said. “We have heard from the Azerbaijani government that there is nothing to see, nothing to worry about, but if that is the case, then we have to allow international observers.”
The US government would also put pressure on Azerbaijan to guarantee the human rights of Karabakh Armenians and to ensure that the Azerbaijani armed forces “comply with international humanitarian law”. Two hundred have been killed since Azerbaijan’s attack on Nagorno-Karabakh last Tuesday. A ceasefire was violated by Azerbaijan earlier this week. Residents of the area have been facing shortages of food and medicine for months after Azerbaijani forces blocked the only access road to the area.