Armenia, Azerbaijan UN Delegates Speak on Peoples’ Right to Self-Determination

Meetings and consultations continue to take place as part of the 65th session of the UN General Assembly in New York. Representatives from a few dozen countries’ delegations and international organizations spoke yesterday during discussions on the agenda item “peoples’ right to self-determination.”

Armenia also participated in the discussions, represented by Permanent Representative of the Republic of Armenia to the UN, Ambassador Garen Nazarian, who said that violation of this right leads to tragic consequences, war and destruction, according to a release issued by the RA Ministry of Foreign affairs press and information department. 

Nazarian said that the people of Nagorno-Karabakh, realizing peoples’ right to self-determination, made their choice in favor of sovereignty, and exerted all legal means to achieve this goal. 

The Armenian ambassador also stressed the importance of the UN’s role and mandate to ensure the realization of nations’ and people’s right to self-determination on an unconditional and permanent basis.

Additional discussions took place between the delegations of Armenia and Azerbaijan. 

The Armenian representative found it ridiculous that Azerbaijan made a statement on this agenda item while making attempts to ignore the Karabakh people’s right to self-determination. In his statement, Nazarian added:

“The means of protecting human and fundamental rights have always been absent in Azerbaijan; they have been replaced by arbitrary and illegal acts. The international community witnessed that, as a result of continuing xenophobia and intolerance, massacres, murders, torture which shook the world with their ferocity and barbarity were carried out against Armenians in Azerbaijani cities.

“This was Azerbaijan’s response to Nagorno-Karabakh when the latter realized its indissoluble right to self-determination. The current situation in the region is the outcome of the ethnic cleansing of Nagorno-Karabakh residents, mass murders and, finally, military aggression and war on the part of Azerbaijan’s government.”