Azernews.Az

By Sara Rajabova

A document proving the historical crimes of the Armenians against Azerbaijani people has been revealed in the archives of the French Foreign Ministry, Consulate General of Azerbaijan in Los-Angeles said on its Facebook page.

The consulate general said this document is an evidence of the genocide committed by Armenians against Azerbaijani people.

The document was sent to the French Foreign Ministry by the then French High Commissioner for Caucasus, Damien de Martel, based in Tbilisi.

The consulate said in this report, Martel described how in the present-day Armenia, in the vicinity of Armenia's capital city of Yerevan, 4000 Azerbaijanis, including women and children, were subjected to massacre by the Armenian army in June 1920.

Damien de Martel's report was sent to the French Foreign Ministry on July 20, 1920.

"...As for these military operations, I obtained from witnesses who came back recently from Armenia some information on how the operations are executed. In the south of Erivan, at the end of last June, the Armenian troops encircled 25 Tatar [Azerbaijani] villages, inhabited by more than 40,000 Muslims [Azerbaijanis]. This population, too close to the capital city to have any designs of independence, had always been quiet and peaceful; they were expelled with cannon shots to the Aras River and were forced to leave their villages, which were immediately occupied by Armenian refugees. During this event, about 4,000 persons were put to death, including women and children, drowned by Armenian soldiers in the Aras River," the report said.

On one hand this document evidences that the Armenians requiring help from the French, urged the French to protect them from the Bolsheviks and even to occupy the "historical Armenian lands" in Turkey.

On the other hand, the commissioner acknowledges the genocide committed against Azerbaijanis, according to the consulate general.

This document is a clear evidence of the Armenian vandalism, ruthlessness and liar. The Armenians always claimed that Turks, Muslims committed genocide against them and occupied their territories. However, this document shows that it was the Armenians who always covet others lands and committed the cruel massacres against the representatives of other nations.

The Armenian nationalists also committed genocide against Azerbaijani people on March 31, 1918.

The Armenian Dashnaks led by Stepan Shaumyan committed the ruthless act of genocide against the Azerbaijani people. According to the Institute of History of the National Academy of Sciences (ANAS), 700,000 people became victims of the genocide in Azerbaijan within several days in 1918, starting March 24. As a result, 75 villages in Shamakhi, 122 in Guba and 115 in Zangezur were completely destroyed.

Unfortunately, Armenian grieve crimes against Azerbaijani people was not limited with the mentioned genocides. Armenians massacred the Azerbaijanis in Khojaly town in Nagorno-Karabakh on 26 February 1992.

Armenian armed forces, supported by the ex-Soviet 366th regiment massacred Azerbaijani population in Khojaly 1992, which claimed the life of 613 civilians, including 106 women, 70 elderly, and 83 children. A total of 1,000 civilians were disabled. Eight families were exterminated, and 25 children lost both parents, while 130 children lost one parent. Moreover, 1,275 innocent people were taken hostage, while the fate of 150 remains unknown.

Armenia occupied over 20 percent of Azerbaijan's internationally recognized territory, including Nagorno-Karabakh and seven adjacent regions, after laying territorial claims against its South Caucasus neighbor that caused a brutal war in the early 1990s. Long-standing efforts by US, Russian and French mediators have been largely fruitless so far.

As a result of the military aggression of Armenia, over 20,000 Azerbaijanis were killed, 4,866 are reported missing and almost 100,000 were injured, and 50,000 were disabled.

The UN Security Council has passed four resolutions on Armenian withdrawal from the Azerbaijani territory, but they have not been enforced to this day.