Occupation of Zangilan

On October 29th 1993, 20 years ago, the Zangilan district of the Republic of Azerbaijan was occupied by the armed forces of the Republic of Armenia. On the eve of the occupation, the Armenian armed forces launched a massive attack on the district center of Zangilan from the border areas of the Republic of Armenia and the occupied territories of Azerbaijan.
Zangilan, located on the railway connecting Baku with Julfa and Nakhchivan, had an important strategic value. Before the seizure of the Zangilan district, there was only one city on its territory, one settlement and 83 villages. The area had a number of social infrastructure facilities, including 67 schools, 56 libraries, 34 clubs, 9 cultural centers, 7 hospitals, 6 train stations, two wineries and one train depot... The occupation of Zangilan entailed heavy consequences: 200 inhabitants were killed, 395 children lost at least one of their parents, about fifty people were missing, 127 became invalids. As a result of a continuous policy of ethnic cleansing pursued by Armenia, the residents of Zangilan were expelled. Today, 35,000 displaced people from the city of Zangilan and their descendants are scattered across the various regions of Azerbaijan. The historical, cultural and natural heritage of the city has been completely destroyed.
The occupation of Zangilan was the last stage in the military operations of the Armenian armed forces in the occupied Nagorno-Karabakh region of Azerbaijan and seven surrounding districts.
The international community has repeatedly expressed its position on the conflict. Thus, trying to resolve the conflict peacefully, the OSCE Minsk Group was established in 1992. The UN Security Council adopted resolutions 822 , 853 , 874 and 884 (the latter relates to the occupation of Zangilan). The resolutions affirmed the sovereignty, territorial integrity and inviolability of the borders of Azerbaijan. In addition, the Security Council demanded to carry out an immediate and unconditional withdrawal of Armenian forces from the occupied territories of Azerbaijan.
The European Union, the Council of Europe, the Organization for Islamic Cooperation and other international organizations have also produced documents regarding the conflict. All of these documents, which are part of the legal framework for the resolution of the conflict, support the territorial integrity of the Republic of Azerbaijan and demand to end the occupation of Azerbaijani lands.
However, the Republic of Armenia continues its illegal actions, especially the efforts aimed at delaying the military occupation and its consequences, artificially changing the demographic situation in the occupied territories of the Republic of Azerbaijan, thus ignoring the position of the international community which condemns such activities. Recently, about two hundred Armenian refugees from Syria were settled in the occupied territories of the Zangilan district, which is more clear evidence of the illegal settlement policy pursued by the Armenian government.


The Azerbaijani side expects the international community to ensure the restoration of the territorial integrity of the Republic of Azerbaijan, reach a peaceful settlement of the Armenian-Azerbaijani Nagorno-Karabakh conflict which is a threat to peace and stability in the region as well as adopt a more decisive approach to the quick resolution of this problem and reject attempts to consolidate results of the military occupation, particularly through illegal immigration.