YEREVAN. – The Armenian side has drawn the United Nations (UN) High Commissioners’ attention several times on the gross violations of human rights and international humanitarian law, as a result of the hostilities which Azerbaijan had unleashed in April.
Tigran Balayan, spokesperson at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Armenia (RA MFA), stated the above-said commenting, at the request of Armenian News-NEWS.am, on the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights’ statement Tuesday in Geneva, Switzerland.
Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, had delivered an opening statement at the 33rd session of the Human Rights Council.
In his remarks, he also reflected on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.
“My Office has had no access to the conflict situation in Nagorno-Karabakh, including since the events of April 2016. Consequently, conflicting claims of human rights violations cannot be verified, and the plight of hundreds of thousands of internally displaced people and refugees has not received the kind of human rights scrutiny that it deserves,” Al Hussein had stated, in particular.
Balayan noted that the Armenian side has called upon the UN High Commissioner to impartially assess Azerbaijan’s inhumane acts committed against the Armenian military and civilians.
“We are convinced that a targeted comprehensive assessment will become a factor that deters Azerbaijan from taking similar actions,” the Armenian MFA spokesperson added.
“In his remarks, the RA permanent representative reflected on the observations in the report on Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, expressing regret that an assessment mission to Nagorno-Karabakh by the Office of the High Commissioner has not taken place till now, and reaffirming the RA’s readiness to fully support and contribute to the visit to Nagorno-Karabakh by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights,” Tigran Balayan also noted. “But the consent of all the parties involved in the conflict is necessary to carry out the visit. And it is apparent as to which party hinders this process, to this day.”
As reported earlier, Davit Babayan, the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic (NKR/Artsakh) Presidential Spokesperson, on Wednesday informed about the NKR authorities’ readiness to cooperate with the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.
