“Fool Me Once, Shame on You, Fool Me Twice, Shame on Me”
Azerbaijan fooled the world once, with enormous shame sitting squarely on its shoulders as it is seemingly fooling the world yet again, there’s an even greater shame in the making, but this time it belongs to what appears to be an unconcerned world who has not yet woken up, while Armenians haven’t slept well for more than four years.
It all started in the fall of 2020 when Azerbaijan, assisted by Turkey and others, attacked the peaceful Armenian population of Artsakh and for 44 days rained down bombs and missiles and unleashed indiscriminate killer drones on civilian infrastructure, including schools, hospitals and religious sites. What followed were unimaginable violations of human rights, culminating in Azerbaijan’s 10-month blockade of the Armenian populated region, which led to the forced displacement and ethnic cleansing of Armenians in what international human rights experts have called a genocide.
The International Court of Justice told Azerbaijan to stop. The United Nations Special Rapporteurs told Azerbaijan to stop. The European Court of Human Rights told Azerbaijan to stop. Leading legal scholars told Azerbaijan to stop.
Azerbaijan hasn’t stopped.
Instead, Azerbaijan is on the hunt again, with its sights shifting to what should not be easy targets: powerful policymakers and the general public as a whole. This time around, Azerbaijan is trying desperately, and unfortunately somewhat successfully, to take advantage of pervasive indifference to the devastating human suffering it wrought in the Artsakh homeland. It’s counting on everyone to shrug their shoulders and change the conversation.
But life doesn’t, or at least it shouldn’t, just go on.
The 29th Conference of the Parties (COP29) to the UN framework on climate change begins this week in Azerbaijan, a country whose economy is almost exclusively dependent on fossil fuels, has hundreds of political prisoners including journalists, politicians, and ethnic minorities such as Armenians from Artsakh.
This, though, is not only an Armenian issue. Many broad-based civic protests, registering legitimate and serious concerns about human rights, and a barrage of articles in the international press have exposed the Azerbaijan government for being an oil based, corrupt and oppressive regime. Armenians know this first-hand all too well, and now it appears the word is getting out. Its dictator Ilham Aliyev remains in power since inheriting the castle from his father over 20 years ago.
We welcome the World Council of Churches’ invitation to all people of good will to join in prayer for peace for Armenia, support for the refugees from Artsakh, and release of Armenian hostages in Azerbaijan, taking place in Geneva, Switzerland this Sunday, November 10th, the day before the opening of COP29 in Azerbaijan.
We encourage our communities to heed the call and attend local churches this Sunday to join in the prayer day for Armenia and Artsakh in solidarity with the World Council of Churches and both our Catholicoses.
We welcome the initiatives of the local Armenian high schools from both the Prelacy and Diocese whose students will march together from Ferrahian Armenian School/Holy Martyrs Armenian Church to St. Peter Armenian Church this week to raise awareness about the plight of Artsakhtsis, to secure their right of return under international guarantees of safety and security, and to accelerate the release of Armenian hostages and POWs still illegally held captive in Baku.
We are proud of and support the AYF’s unwavering commitment to the defense of the rights of the Armenian people everywhere and especially Artsakh during the past four years. Most recently with their commemoration of our people’s resilience and unbreakable path back to Artsakh in September and last night’s Candlelight Vigil for Shushi.
Finally, we must remain steadfast and resolute in our commitment to the Armenian Cause, working in unison to defend our right to exist as Armenians, to preserve our cultural heritage in Artsakh while securing Armenians’ right of return and the release of Armenian POWs, and continuing to do so with renewed political activism in the United States via the ANCA and the ANCA-WR.
ARF Western U.S.A. Central Committee
November 9, 2024
