Armenia files lawsuit against Azerbaijan at International Court of Justice

Armenia has filed a lawsuit at the International Court of Justice, demanding the implementation of measures to prevent Azerbaijan from violating the International Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination in Nagorno-Karabakh, the court’s website reported on Friday.

In the lawsuit, Armenia stated that Azerbaijan must refrain from” taking any actions aimed at or having the effect of displacing the remaining ethnic Armenians from Nagorno-Karabakh”, enforcing “punitive actions against the current or former political representatives or military personnel of Nagorno-Karabakh”, and called on Baku to facilitate access of the United Nations and its specialised agencies to the ethnic Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Armenia also requested the court instruct Azerbaijan not to “alter or destroy” monuments in Karabakh commemorating the 1915 Armenian genocide or any other memorials or Armenian cultural artefacts in the region.

On 19 September, Azerbaijan launched a military offensive in Nagorno-Karabakh, a self-proclaimed republic that is legally part of Azerbaijan but whose largely Armenian population seceded in 1991, in an attempt to bring the region fully under its control, having been emboldened by a recent nadir in Armenia’s relations with its long-time ally and security guarantor Russia.

Within 24 hours, the Karabakh authorities said they had agreed to a ceasefire brokered by Russia’s peacekeeping mission in the region, describing efforts by the international community to stop the war as “insufficient”.

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said that Armenia had not taken part in the negotiations between Nagorno-Karabakh and Azerbaijan. As of Saturday, over 100,000 ethnic Armenians had left Nagorno-Karabakh for Armenia, with another 20,000 believed to still be in the region or waiting in line to exit it.