Armenia takes Azerbaijan to UN court alleging discrimination

By MIKE CORDER | Associated Press

THE HAGUE, Netherlands — Armenia is taking its decades agelong territorial quality with neighboring Azerbaijan — that erupted into equipped struggle again past twelvemonth — to the United Nations’ highest court.

Armenia filed a lawsuit astatine the International Court of Justice alleging breaches by Azerbaijan of an planetary normal that aims to destruct radical discrimination, the tribunal announced precocious Thursday.

Armenia alleges that arsenic a effect of what it calls a “State-sponsored argumentation of Armenian hatred, Armenians person been subjected to systemic discrimination, wide killings, torture and different abuse,” the tribunal said.

The lawsuit centers of the Nagorno-Karabakh portion of Azerbaijan that has been nether the power of taste Armenian forces backed by the Armenian authorities for much than a 4th of a century.

During the Soviet era, the predominantly Armenian-populated portion had an autonomous presumption wrong Azerbaijan. Long-simmering tensions betwixt Christian Armenians and mostly Muslim Azeris boiled implicit arsenic the Soviet Union collapsed. Conflict broke retired successful 1988 erstwhile the portion tried to articulation Armenia, and escalated into warfare aft the 1991 illness of the USSR, leaving an estimated 30,000 dormant and displacing astir 1 million.

Fighting that erupted again a twelvemonth agone killed hundreds, making it the biggest flare-up successful the struggle since 1994.

Armenia alleges that Azerbaijani committed “grave violations of the radical favoritism convention” during past year’s fighting.

The Armenian lawsuit says that adjacent aft a Russia-brokered ceasefire came into unit connected Nov. 10, ”Azerbaijan has continued to prosecute successful the murder, torture and different maltreatment of Armenian prisoners of war, hostages and different detained persons,” according to the court.

Azerbaijan is expected to record a akin lawsuit against Armenia adjacent week astatine the satellite court.

“In the coming days, we volition clasp #Armenia to relationship for breaches of the International Convention connected the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination,” Azerbaijan’s lawman Foreign Minister Elnur Mammadov said successful a tweet. “30 years of quality rights abuses against Azerbaijanis during concern volition not beryllium tolerated.”

Leila Abdullaeva, caput of the Azerbaijan overseas ministry’s property department, alleged Friday that, since the ceasefire, Armenia has prevented Azerbaijanis from returning to their homes done indiscriminate mining of the erstwhile occupied territories and refusing to supply excavation maps to Azerbaijan.

In its case, Armenia besides asks the tribunal to urgently bid alleged “provisional measures” to support the state and Armenians “from further harm, and to forestall the aggravation oregon hold of this dispute” portion the lawsuit is handled by the court.

The satellite court, formally known arsenic the International Court of Justice, deals with quality betwixt nations. Cases often instrumentality years to beryllium resolved.

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Associated Press writer Aida Sultanova successful Baku, Azerbaijan, contributed.