David Lammy has sparked a diplomatic row after writing in a recent blog post that Azerbaijan has been able to “liberate” territory in a conflict widely regarded as an ethnic cleansing. GB News has the story.
The Foreign Secretary’s view that the Nagorno-Karabakh region has been “liberated” stands in contrast to the official stance of the British Government.
Last September, a senior British ambassador slammed Azerbaijan’s use of force after violence restarted in its ethnic and territorial conflict with Armenia over the Nagorno-Karabakh region.
Neil Holland said that Azerbaijan’s use of force is unacceptable and reaffirmed that Britain has urged a ceasefire in the long-running conflict.
Holland, the Head of the United Kingdom’s Delegation to the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), slammed Azerbaijan’s decision to commence a military operation in the region after a lull in violence.
Holland’s statements came after Azerbaijan launched a significant military offensive against the self-declared breakaway state of Artsakh.
This was widely condemned as a violation of the ceasefire agreement penned after the 2020 ethnic conflict. …
The Azerbaijani invasion has been described as an ethnic cleansing of Nagorno-Karabakh Armenians and a second Armenian genocide by a former Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court.
Lammy has been urged to retract his comments by an influential professor who covers the conflict.
Mark Movsesion, the Frederick A. Whitney Professor and Director of the Mattone Center for Law and Religion at St. John’s University Law School, said he was shocked by Lammy’s statement.
“The Foreign Secretary’s reference to Azerbaijan’s ‘liberation’ of Nagorno-Karabakh is shockingly callous and ignorant.
“In fact, exactly a year ago, Baku ethnically cleansed the region of its 120,000 Christian Armenian inhabitants in violation of an order from the International Court of Justice.”
Movsesion, who is based in New York, said: “Additionally, Lammy seems to think Azerbaijan, like Ukraine, is trying to free itself from Russian domination. In fact, Azerbaijan and Russia are strategic partners, and Azerbaijan carried out the ethnic cleansing of Karabakh with Russian acquiescence.” …
Discussing how Ukrainians take pride in their closer links with Europe, Lammy discussed how other states near Russia are rejecting Moscow for other powers.
“The same effect is notable across Russia’s neighbours. The states of Central Asia look increasingly east and south.
“Azerbaijan has been able to liberate territory it lost in the early 1990s.”
GB News understands that the remark sparked widespread diplomatic concerns in Yerevan, with Armenian officials engaging with the British Foreign Office for clarification.
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