What happened to Nagorno-Karabakh? The aftermath of the Azerbaijani offensive

Photo Courtesy: Maxim Atayants

Through a military takeover that lasted less than a day, Azerbaijani forces managed not only to dissolve the Republic of Artsakh, but to erase almost all of the presence of ethnic Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh. As of the beginning of October, the vast majority of this estimated 120,000 strong population has fled across the border to Armenia. 

To recap

Last month, on the 19th of September, Azerbaijan launched an attack on the de facto independent - but internationally unrecognised - Republic of Artsakh, inhabited mainly by ethnic Armenians. The next day, both sides reached a ceasefire agreement, and further negotiations resulted in the decision that the breakaway state would be officially dissolved by the beginning of 2024, almost 32 years after the state declared independence. Ilham Aliyev, the president of Azerbaijan, indicated his desire to peacefully reintegrate the Armenian population with the rest of Azerbaijan. 

Decades of conflict

However, such assurances seem hard to believe considering the previous actions taken by Mr Aliyev and Azerbaijan. The mountains of the South Caucasus have been hotly contested for much of their history, but tensions have again come to the fore under the current president’s term.

Mr Aliyev, who has ruled Azerbaijan as an authoritarian president since 2003, has made various anti-Armenian statements, not only targeting those living in Nagorno-Karabakh. He has publicly stated that 'Western Azerbaijan [Armenia] is our historical land.' 

This aggressive approach towards Armenia has also been seen in action. In 2020, Aliyev launched an offensive, the first since the War of 1988-1994, which resulted in Artsakh's de facto independence, but which also meant Azerbaijan regained all Armenian-occupied territories surrounding Artsakh. While there were reports of war crimes on both sides, Azerbaijan did not stop with the end of the conflict. An unknown number of prisoners of war remained in captivity, and reports by human rights organisations such as Human Rights Watch indicated these ethnic Armenians were subjects of mistreatment and torture.

Last year, Azerbaijan adopted an even more aggressive stance towards Artsakh by implementing a blockade against the Republic. Under the guise of environmental activism against alleged illegal mining in Artsakh, Azerbaijani protesters blocked the Lachin corridor - a single road linking Armenia with Artsakh, established as part of the 2020 ceasefire agreement to provide Artsakh with basic necessities. From the beginning, the blockade's justification on environmental grounds was put into question, with protesters suspected of being employees of state-owned companies. Later, in April of this year, Azerbaijan also established an official checkpoint, further blocking the freedom of movement through the corridor. The result was a humanitarian disaster that included shortages of food, medicine, and hygiene products. Lucas Ocampo, the first Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, has gone as far as to label the situation an example of genocide, due to the apparent aim of bringing physical destruction to a group of people.

We can see why Mr Aliyev’s suggestion of peaceful reintegration would not have been trusted by many civilians in the region, and why so many have now left their homes and fled to Armenia. When on the 15th October the Azerbaijani military raised their flag over the former Artsakh capital, Stepanakert, Mr Aliyev stated that his country had "waited 20 years" to see Azerbaijani rule in Karabakh, and that "this victory will stay in our history forever".

It is hard to consider the current flight of Armenians as voluntary. Some legal experts, such as Priya Pillai and Melanie O'Brien - Visiting Professor at the University of Minnesota and President of the International Association of Genocide Scholars respectively - claim that the flight might constitute a war crime under the ICC regulations. If this disaster was the result of a “coercive environment”, it would qualify as forcible deportation. 

What happens now?

Some people might hope that the international community can help solve this crisis. Sadly, this seems unlikely. While many in the West have called on both countries to ensure humanitarianism is respected, it does not appear that they plan to enforce this in any way. This is especially unlikely considering that the EU recently approached Azerbaijan with the aim of signing  a gas deal, as an alternative to the sanctioned Russia. 

While this gas proposal has been put on hold, it remains to be seen how long such resolve will last. The eyes of the Western public have quickly moved back to the conflict in Ukraine and the new war between Israel and Hamas, rapidly decreasing the level of concern about the situation in the South Caucasus. 

This Western inertia might prove even more tragic as Armenia’s historical ally, Russia, has now adopted a more pro-Azerbaijani stance. Armenia’s recent move towards more pro-European policy, with its government deciding to sign the Rome Statute and put Armenia under the jurisdiction of the ICC - the same court that had just issued an arrest warrant for Mr Putin - has angered Russia. 

It would appear that another humanitarian disaster has occurred in Nagorno-Karabakh, and that little is being done to help.