"I would like to inform the Azerbaijani public, especially the families of missing persons who continue to wait for their loved ones with hope, that in the coming days the remains of several missing martyrs whose identities have been established will be handed over to their families," Deputy Chief of the State Security Service, Sharafat Hasanov, said at the international conference titled "Modern Approaches and Strengthening Cooperation in Resolving the Issue of Missing Persons," held within the framework of cooperation with the International Commission on Missing Persons (ICMP), APA reports.
He said that determining the fate of Azerbaijani citizens who went missing as a result of Armenia's military aggression against Azerbaijan has been seriously affected not only by the excessive contamination of the territories with mines and unexploded ordnance during the 30-year occupation, and the destruction of infrastructure, settlements, landscapes, terrain, and even burial sites as a result of acts of vandalism, but also by the Armenian side's failure to provide information about burial locations.
"It is known that after the 44-day Second Karabakh War, senior Armenian military officials who gave interviews to the media, including former Armenian Deputy Defense Minister and later Member of Parliament General Gagik Melkonyan, Samvel Babayan, and others, repeatedly stated that they had information about the burial sites of missing Azerbaijani servicemen. However, this information has still not been provided to the Azerbaijani side. Moreover, former Armenian Deputy Defense Minister General Manvel Grigoryan did not even hesitate to admit in media interviews that he had personally held Azerbaijani prisoners.
We believe that all of this not only contradicts universally accepted principles of humanity but also constitutes a violation of international humanitarian law.
The Republic of Azerbaijan is open to the world in resolving the issue of missing persons, and we once again declare that we are ready to cooperate with the Armenian side in this field," he said.
Follow us on Telegram
t.me/apanewsaz
Follow us on Instagram
Follow us on TikTok
Follow us on Facebook
Follow us on X
