Although Armenian occupation of Azerbaijan’s territory ended in 2020, a UNESCO mission has yet to arrive, and I once again publicly call for such a mission, Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov said in New York at the General Debate of the 77th session of the UN General Assembly.

“Armenia has inflicted long-term damage on the environment in Azerbaijan. Also, thousands of cultural heritage objects of Azerbaijan have been destroyed, plundered or misappropriated by Armenia. Earlier this year, ISESCO has sent a technical mission to Azerbaijan to undertake a post-conflict State of Conservation Assessment of the Cultural Heritage in its liberated territories. For decades,

Azerbaijan has called on Armenia to support an independent, transparent UNESCO mission to assess and advise on the protection and preservation of cultural heritage in the region. Although Armenian occupation of Azerbaijan’s territory ended in 2020, a UNESCO mission has yet to arrive, and I once again publicly call for such a mission.

The scale of violations and destructions demonstrates the clear intent and purpose to terrorize, kill and expel Azerbaijani civilians, and erase all traces of Azerbaijan from these territories,” he noted.

Faktyoxla Lab has tried to find out how justified these statements of the Azerbaijani minister are.

Let’s start with the fact that Armenia plundered and “protected” for about 30 years the cultural heritage of Azerbaijan in its territories, which it kept under occupation all this time. The entire cultural infrastructure, cemeteries, mosques, Christian and other monuments in these territories were purposefully destroyed by the occupying forces of Armenia.

The facts testify that during the occupation of Karabakh and adjacent territories by the armed forces of Armenia, Armenians destroyed Islamic monuments and shrines, tried to Armenize Albanian churches.

The facts collected by the Institute of Archeology and Ethnography of the Azerbaijan National Academy of Sciences show that the historical monuments of the Islamic period that remained in the occupied territories were ruthlessly destroyed. Because of the Muslim epigraphy, they could not be Armenianized and presented as non-Azerbaijani. These include gravestones, tombs and mosques. According to the institute’s research, the number of historical and cultural monuments destroyed in the years after the ceasefire in 1994 exceeded the number of monuments destroyed during the military conflict.

According to the list prepared by the State Committee for Work with Religious Organizations, there were 403 historical and religious monuments in Karabakh and adjacent regions. As many as 67 of them are mosques, 144 are temples and 192 are sanctuaries.

Armenians completely or partially destroyed 63 out of 67 Muslim mosques officially operating in Nagorno-Karabakh and adjacent regions (13 in Shusha, 5 in Aghdam, 16 in Fuzuli, 12 in Zangilan, 5 in Jabrayil, 8 in Gubadli, 8 in Lachin).

There were reports of the destruction of Islamic heritage in the occupied territories during the occupation. Photo and video materials were published on this occasion.

For example, the Armenians destroyed the Saatli mosque in Shusha on May 8, 1992, immediately after the occupation of the city. According to the Ministry of Culture of Azerbaijan, the mosque, built according to the project of the architect Karbalai Safikhan Garabaghi in 1883, was turned into ruins, the interior was completely destroyed, and the minaret was partially destroyed.

This fact was confirmed after the liberation of Shusha. From the widespread photos it can be seen that the Saatli mosque has fallen into disrepair. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev spoke about this in detail during his visit to Shusha.

The famous Ashagi Govhar Agha mosque in Shusha was also destroyed. The Armenians carried out reconstruction only in the city’s Upper Govhar Agha mosque.

But the goal was not to preserve a monument of Islamic architecture, but to pass it off as a Persian mosque. According to open sources, the renovation of the mosque was carried out by the Iranian company Part Saman Cahan Co. The Azerbaijani side reported that the interior of the mosque was changed during the renovation.

The Aghdam Juma Mosque is one of the monuments destroyed during the occupation, where, as evidenced by photo and video materials, cows and pigs were kept. The facts show that this mosque was destroyed immediately after the Armenian occupation of the region in 1993.

The double minarets of the Juma Mosque, built by the architect Karbalai Safikhan Garabaghi in 1868-1870, were demolished from the inside, the vault collapsed in several places, part of the premises burned down, the walls were covered with insulting expressions.

The attitude of Armenians towards Islamic heritage can be judged from a photo taken by former Armenian President Robert Kocharyan at the entrance to Aghdam Juma Mosque. In a photo provided by zham.am, Kocharyan is standing at the entrance to a mosque with his henchmen. According to the website, the photo was taken a few months after the occupation of Aghdam, where Kocharyan arrived as president of the so-called “NKR.” It is reported that the commander of the so-called “army” of the NKR Samvel Babayan is next to him. The photo also shows Russian swear words on the wall of the mosque.

The Armenians did not touch only the minarets of the mosque. However, they did this not at all out of love for the Islamic heritage, but with a completely different goal. During the Second Karabakh War, it became known that the Armenians used the minarets of the mosque for military purposes. Since there were no other tall buildings nearby, the minarets served as observation towers to determine the coordinates and adjust shelling. That is why they have been preserved.

As we have already mentioned, there is documentary evidence of the state of the mentioned mosques during the occupation.

However, we have witnessed the same fate of mosques in other regions liberated as a result of the Second Karabakh War.

After the liberation of the Gubadli district in October last year, a video about a mosque in the Mamar village of this district was distributed. Video footage confirms that the Armenians not only destroyed the 18th century mosque, but also used it as a pigsty. In the Zangilan district, the Armenians tried to completely destroy the mosque and wipe it off the earth.

During one of his visits to the district, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev made a detailed statement and sharply criticized the position of international organizations: “Notice what the hated enemy has done to the mosque. All our religious sites have been destroyed by the enemy. The world has been tight-lipped for 30 years. We have repeatedly raised this issue, raised it in the international arena – our historical and religious sites have been destroyed and desecrated. We have shown those images many times. Showing the condition of the Aghdam mosque, the Shusha mosques and other mosques under occupation at the time, we said that the hated enemy had destroyed and desecrated our religious sites.

After the liberation of Zangilan, a video was circulated of pigs in one of the mosques. The enemy has insulted our religion, insulted all the Muslims. There was a mosque here, but now it is gone, they have destroyed it. Some are raising the issue of the religious heritage of the Armenian people in the liberated lands now. But why didn’t anyone raise the issue of our national and religious heritage? A UNESCO official has recently made an unfounded statement that they had allegedly asked us but Azerbaijan remained silent. We have repeatedly appealed to UNESCO for 30 years, repeatedly stated that our mosques have been destroyed, our historical sites have been destroyed, our historical sites have been Armenianized. Have they sent a mission here at least once? Has our request been answered at least once? As soon as the war ended, they started to protect the sites of the Armenian people. We are protecting all sites, we are protecting the sites of all nations, and the world knows that. But you should have a look, there was a mosque here, UNESCO, come here, come and see this,” Ilham Aliyev said.

Shortly after Azerbaijan liberated the occupied territories during the Second Karabakh War, the leadership of UNESCO proposed an independent expert mission to effectively protect the heritage of the region in accordance with the 1954 Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict.

In this regard, on December 21, 2020, the organization issued a statement that the member states of the Committee for the Protection of Cultural Heritage welcomed the initiative and confirmed the need to send a mission to Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding regions to assess the state of cultural property. In addition, the representative of the organization, Ernesto Ottone, accused the Azerbaijani side of not responding to this proposal yet. He noted that they expect an urgent response from Azerbaijan.

However, Baku immediately responded to the organization’s proposal, declaring its support for the mission, only noting that it would take time to ensure complete security, since the Armenians had laid mines in the area during their retreat.

Did the organization that proposes to conduct an independent expert mission to effectively protect the heritage of the region try to assess the state of Islamic heritage monuments in Karabakh?

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev then commented on this issue at a meeting with the minister of culture. He said that there were many appeals, and these appeals were documented in the form of letters.

“Two years ago, the new UNESCO leadership was asked to send a mission here, to send a mission to the occupied lands and see what is left of our historical sites. What was the response of the UNESCO leadership? They said that they did not want to politicize the issue. Okay, if you did not want to politicize the issue two years ago, why do you want to politicize it now? Let them give an answer, provide a very simple answer, a logical answer. There is no reply,” Ilham Aliyev noted.

Assistant to the President of Azerbaijan - Head of the Foreign Policy Department of the Presidential Administration Hikmet Hajiyev told AzerTag that Azerbaijan repeatedly offered to send a UNESCO mission to the occupied territories to investigate and prevent Armenia’s illegal actions.

“In order to investigate and prevent the illegal actions of Armenia, Azerbaijan has repeatedly suggested that UNESCO send a mission to our occupied territories. Armenia, the aggressor state, demonstrated an unconstructive approach and prevented all of Azerbaijan’s calls for the UNESCO mission to be sent.

The international community, including UNESCO, has been continuously informed about Armenia's illegal actions in the occupied territories of Azerbaijan. There have been a number of publications in this regard. For example, a book entitled “War against Azerbaijan – an attack on cultural heritage” was published and submitted to UNESCO in 2007. The book contains extensive information about the cultural and religious sites that Armenia has destroyed in the occupied territories of our country, their deliberate Armenianization and the description of Albanian churches as Armenian ones. But there was no adequate response from UNESCO,” Hajiyev noted.

“For example, back in 2008, during a visit of the then Director-General of UNESCO, Koichiro Matsuura, to our country, the Azerbaijani side proposed to organize such a mission. At the time, the director-general said they were looking into the matter and could not comment on the timing of the mission,” he added.

Studies show that none of the international organizations to which Azerbaijan applied with a request regarding destruction of historical and cultural monuments in the territories occupied by Armenia established a fact-finding commission. This process was artificially delayed. In many cases, Armenia interfered with the process.

Based on the above-mentioned facts, Faktyoxla Lab concludes that UNESCO is trying to forget about the Islamic heritage in Karabakh and the surrounding areas.