Vehicles carrying refugees from Nagorno-
Karabakh queue on the road leading towards the Armenian border, September 25, 2023.
Okt 02, 2023. Posted by Balkan Periscope - Hellas
The mass evacuation of Nagorno-Karabakh’s ethnic Armenian population has been practically completed, outgoing authorities in Stepanakert indicated late on Sunday after at least 100,000 local residents fled to Armenia, refusing to live under Azerbaijani rule.
“The last bus from Artsakh reached [the Armenian border town of] Goris with 15 passengers on board,” Karabakh’s human rights ombudsman, Gegham Stepanian, wrote on Facebook.
He said that a “small team of dedicated people” will stay in Karabakh for
now to look for “helpless” civilians who may be stuck in their homes and unable
to join the exodus on their own.
“If you still have clear information about lonely or helpless people left
behind in Artsakh, you should contact the International Committee of the Red
Cross or provide us with relevant information to be forwarded to the ICRC,”
added Stepanian.
A separate Karabakh government statement issued around the same time said
Samvel Shahramanian, the Karabakh president, and a “group of other officials”
will stay in Stepanakert until the ongoing search for people do died or went
missing as a result of last week’s hostilities and powerful explosion at a
local fuel depot is over. They will also help people remaining in Karabakh “for
various reasons” and keen to relocate to Armenia, said the statement.
The Armenian government reported, meanwhile, that 100,514 “forcibly
displaced” Karabakh residents have entered Armenia since the start of the
exodus resulting from Azerbaijan’s September 19-20 military offensive that
paved the way for the restoration of Baku’s full control over the territory.
Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian predicted on Thursday that “there will be no
Armenians left in Nagorno-Karabakh in the coming days.” He accused Azerbaijan
of practically finishing “ethnic cleansing” there. Baku rejected the
accusations, saying that it still hopes to "reintegrate" the Karabakh
Armenians.
Armenia - Karabakh refugees wait in a square of Goris on September 29, 2023 before being evacuated in various Armenian cities.
Artak Beglarian, a former Karabakh premier, said late on Saturday that the
region is already “almost fully empty, with at most a few hundred people
remaining, who are also leaving.”
Karabakh’s population officially stood at around 120,000 prior to the
exodus. The figure included thousands of people who were unable to return from
Armenia to Stepanakert and other Karabakh towns and villages after Baku blocked
traffic through the Lachin corridor last December.
Earlier on Sunday, Azerbaijan’s prosecutor-general said that Baku wants to
arrest and prosecute about 300 current or former political and military leaders
of Karabakh. They apparently include three former Karabakh presidents. A
Karabakh official told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service on Friday that Shahramanian is
trying to convince Azerbaijani authorities to let them as well as other
prominent Karabakh Armenians leave the region.
Karabakh’s former premier Ruben Vardanyan, former Foreign Minister Davit
Babayan, former army commander Levon Mnatsakanian and his ex-deputy Davit
Manukian were arrested in recent days while travelling to Armenia through the
Lachin corridor.
azatutyun
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