Azernews.Az

The Consulate General of Azerbaijan in Los Angeles has released a statement about the illegal visits to the occupied territories of Azerbaijan, which organized by the Armenian lobby.

"A trip from California to the occupied territories of Azerbaijan, organized by the Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA) with an intention of showcasing the latter's clout, turned out to be yet another embarrassment for the Armenian lobby," the statement reads.

"Immediately following a very successful visit of Azerbaijani parliamentarians to California's capital this March, where they were officially hosted by California State Senate - a visit the Armenian lobby tried, but failed to prevent - the lobby embarked on a comprehensive mission to organize a trip for California's elected officials to Azerbaijan's occupied territories.

Azerbaijan has repeatedly made it clear that any trip to the country's occupied territories, including Nagorno-Karabakh and seven adjacent regions, which have been under Armenia's illegal military occupation since over 20 years, is unlawful without proper authorization by Azerbaijan's Government. Moreover, the U.S. State Department is also urging American citizens to avoid any travels to the occupied regions.

Despite "over 5 months of planning", as announced by ANCA, including hundreds of phone calls, emails to and meetings with California officials, the Armenian lobby managed to convince only THREE non-Armenian politicians to join the trip. And one of these officials approached our Consulate General in advance of the trip and requested Azerbaijan's consent to visit the Nagorno-Karabakh region. To camouflage the blunder, ANCA saw no option other than to fill the delegation with ethnic Armenians. Thus, around 80% of the delegation were made of Armenians as well as staffers.

Now the hope is that this blatant failure could serve as a good lesson for the Armenian lobby in general, and for ANCA in particular. It should understand that the times, when they could easily mislead American officials with their anti-Azerbaijani racist propaganda and cheat them into violating international law, are long gone.

Nevertheless, given the very nature of ANCA, which was named "a particularly noxious lobby" by a Washington Post editorial in 2010, this hope might be futile. This is a lobby that claims to represent Armenian Americans, but in fact has turned itself into a propaganda outlet of Armenia's corrupt government in the U.S. At the expense of many unknowing Armenian American donors, this notorious lobby is actually doing nothing but to divert the attention of the Armenian diaspora away from severe maladies ailing Armenia, such as the rampant government corruption, wide-scale human rights abuses, pervasive social injustice, and most importantly from the fact that due to all these problems, Armenia has become a country with one of the world's highest emigration rates, threatening the country's future.

Now, instead of putting pressure on Armenia's leadership to finally solve these serious problems and stop the inhumane treatment of its fellow citizens, ANCA and other radical Armenian lobby organizations keep supporting this government at all costs, and annually channeling millions of dollars from the diaspora to Armenia as a 'humanitarian aid', which then reportedly end up in different foreign bank accounts of Armenia's government officials.

Furthermore, the Armenian lobby continues spreading lies about Azerbaijan in America as well as pressuring U.S. elected officials to take positions against Azerbaijan, a reliable ally of the U.S., to the detriment of America's national interests.

But the ice has already broken, and the latest fiasco of the Armenian lobby is another vivid example of growing American public awareness about Azerbaijan and its tireless fight for justice."