President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev stressed at the Munich Security Conference in response to criticism by a representative of the Armenian Foreign Ministry about the fact that Azerbaijan constantly blames Armenia for all its internal and external problems, saying that it was absolutely untrue. The President reminded that ‘’Armenia was accused by the Council of Europe and the European Parliament itself of severe human rights violations, falsification of presidential and parliamentary elections by the Armenian government." "We accuse Armenia of occupation,’' the President announced the position of Azerbaijan, the head of the European bureau of Vestnik Kavkaza, Orhan Sattorov reports.
"Not only we, but also the UN Security Council, the highest international body, which adopted four resolutions calling for the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of Armenian armed forces from the occupied territories. We accuse the government of Armenia, but not the Armenian people, of the genocide in Khojaly, where innocent civilians were killed by armed gangs only because they were Azerbaijanis. This genocide has been recognized by more than 10 countries. We accuse Armenia of the suffering of millions of people who became refugees on their own land. 40,000 left Nagorno-Karabakh, 750,000 from other occupied regions of Azerbaijan, and 200,000 Azerbaijanis were deported from the territory of Armenia. These are the results of the policy of the neighboring country,’’ Ilham Aliyev reminded, calling to put an end to the occupation once again.
The President pointed out that all further constructive contacts between Azerbaijan and Armenia will be based on the de-occupation of the Azerbaijani territories, including the implementation of the recently adopted PACE resolution on the Sarsang reservoir. "The resolution, adopted less than a month ago by the Council of Europe, emphasizes very important points of this issue and, in particular, makes Armenia responsible for the problem with water supply. Thus, it is necessary to start the process of de-occupation in order to establish cooperation between Armenia and Azerbaijan,’’ he said.
"The best measure of mutual trust will be the beginning of the de-occupation. Not only is Nagorno-Karabakh a historical land of Azerbaijan, but also the seven regions around Nagorno-Karabakh, which were completely destroyed. This occupation has continued for 20 years. Armenia wants to maintain the status quo, and we want to change the situation. Thus, the first step towards this is the beginning of the de-occupation of our territories. After that we will start our cooperation,’’ Aliyev concluded.
There are environmental problems in Azerbaijan, associated with the unresolved Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, although the republic succeeds in the field of environmental protection. "We have managed to reduce emissions to the atmosphere over the last 3-5 years of our independence. In the 1990s, emissions were more than 70 million tons a year, but today they are less than 50 million tons a year, despite the fact that our economy has rapidly grown over these years. But there are many challenges. The main threat for us is the pollution of rivers, as we receive water from the Armenian side. The matter is that there is a strong pollution of rivers in Armenia, and this is a threat to all of us. Unfortunately, emissions continue despite all our attempts to stop the pollution of rivers in Armenia, unfortunately,’’ Ilham Aliyev said.
The Azerbaijani occupied territories have been without any environmental controls during decades. "For more than 20 years we have been suffering not only from the occupation of 20% of our territories, but also a huge amount of illegal activity on those territories. For example, forests are cut down. The region has always been famous for its ancient forests, but now they are illegally cut down for commercial purposes,’’ the President of Azerbaijan concluded.
