Is there no direct threat to the civilian population of Nagorno-Karabakh? Pashinyan’s claim contradicts Mirzoyan’s speech at the UN Security Council

Yesterday, on September 21, Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan, addressing the Azerbaijani aggression in Nagorno Karabakh live on Facebook, claimed that “there is no direct threat to the civilian population of Nagorno-Karabakh” after the ceasefire agreement was reached the previous day.

Today, at the government meeting on September 22, Pashinyan reaffirmed his statement.

“The assessment is the same. There is no direct threat to the lives of the civilian population of Nagorno-Karabakh at the moment. This assessment has improved very little in a positive sense,” said Pashinyan, noting that the Armenian residents of Nagorno-Karabakh who were displaced as a result of the recent aggression by Azerbaijan “may get a chance to return to their homes“.  

On September 21, at the meeting of the UN Security Council to address Azerbaijan’s military aggression against Nagorno-Karabakh, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Armenia Ararat Mirzoyan made statements regarding the security and humanitarian situation of the civilian population in Nagorno Karabakh.

The Fact Investigation Platform compared the statements of the Prime Minister and the Minister of Foreign Affairs regarding the safety situation of civilians, and concluded that they completely contradict each other.

In particular, Mirzoyan noted in his speech that “the intensity and cruelty of the offensive make it clear that the intention is to complete the ethnic cleansing of the Armenian population of Nagorno-Karabakh“.

Mirzoyan stated that civilians, especially children, were the targets of the Azerbaijani attack.

“In the eyes of Azerbaijan, the children of Nagorno-Karabakh are terrorists, and Azerbaijan’s actions, missiles, armored vehicles, artillery and UAVs were directed against those children, their parents and grandparents,” Mirzoyan noted.

The Minister of Foreign Affairs of Armenia also spoke about the manifestations of hate speech, calls for violence and threats against the Armenian residents of Nagorno-Karabakh after the aggression.

“The Azerbaijani social media segment is full of calls to find the missing children and women, to rape them, dismember and feed them to dogs. Azerbaijani users are sharing the profiles of Armenian women from Nagorno-Karabakh on social media making biddings on who will get those women to rape, when they are taken under Azerbaijani custody,” Mirzoyan said.

According to the latest official data, at least 200 people have been killed as a result of the Azerbaijani attack, and more than 400 have been wounded. The number of wounded civilians exceeds 40, of which 13 are children. Currently, civilian deaths total 10, of which 5 are children.

According to former State Minister of Nagorno Karabakh Artak Beglaryan, even after the ceasefire, the Azerbaijani side does not allow the removal of the bodies of civilians from the territories that came under its control as a result of the aggression.

It is noteworthy that after the ceasefire agreement, on September 21, when the first meeting between the representatives of Baku and Stepanakert was held in Evlakh, the Azerbaijani armed forces continued to target the civilian population of Stepanakert and other settlements.

Thus, Pashinyan’s words about the absence of a threat to the civilian population of Nagorno-Karabakh contradict the official data and the information from other credible sources, as well as conflict with Foreign Minister Mirzoyan’s assessments made at the UN Security Council.

Nane Manasyan