BAKU, Azerbaijan, September 24. Leaders of
religious confessions operating in Azerbaijan issued a joint
statement, Trend's
correspondent reports from the event.


The statement was made at an event held at the Caucasus Muslim
Board (CMB) to mark September 27, the Day of Remembrance.


The statement reads:


“We are marking the sixth anniversary of September 27, 2020, a
date that has forever gone down in the history of the Azerbaijani
people. This date will forever remain in the memory not only of our
people but of all humanity as a day celebrating Truth and Justice,
as the starting point on the path to the Great Victory. Our people
will always cherish this Day of Remembrance as a chronicle of
Honor, heroism, and self-sacrifice in the name of the
Motherland!


The war, which began on September 27 and lasted 44 days, went
down in history as a glorious victory for the Azerbaijani Army,
culminating in the enemy’s complete surrender. On November 8,
Armenia’s 30-year policy of occupation came to an end. Azerbaijan
raised the tricolor flag over its ancestral lands, which National
Leader Heydar Aliyev called “a symbol of our statehood and
independence.”


“The international community must clearly understand that the
reasons that led us to September 27 were extremely serious and
indisputable facts. For approximately 30 years, Armenia occupied
20% of Azerbaijan’s territory. The occupation was accompanied by
war and crimes against humanity. As a result of the ethnic
cleansing carried out by Armenia, more than one million
Azerbaijanis became refugees and internally displaced persons.


By failing to comply with UN Security Council resolutions,
Armenia, emboldened by impunity, chose to continue the occupation
and deliberately derailed the negotiation process. In July 2020,
Armenia carried out a military provocation along the state border
with Azerbaijan. As a result of artillery shelling directed at
Azerbaijan’s Tovuz District, 13 military personnel and civilians
were killed.


Later, in August, an Armenian sabotage group crossed the former
line of contact and attempted to carry out terrorist acts against
Azerbaijani military personnel and civilians; however, this attempt
was successfully thwarted.


In response to Armenia’s large-scale attack on Azerbaijani
military positions and the civilian population, on September 27,
Azerbaijan, exercising its right to self-defense as enshrined in
the UN Charter, launched a counteroffensive against Armenia on its
own territory.”


“For 44 days, the Armenian Armed Forces intensively shelled our
districts and cities located along the front line —Aghdam,
Aghajabedi, Beylagan, Dashkesan, Fuzuli, Goranboy, and Tartar. In
the occupied territories, the Armenian Armed Forces destroyed
Muslim and Christian places of worship, violated the laws of war,
norms of international law, and the relevant provisions of the
Geneva Conventions. They also shelled cities, both those located
along the line of contact and those far from the combat zone—with
prohibited weapons and bombs, including Ganja, Barda, Mingachevir,
Gabala, Siyazan, Khizi, and other cities, resulting in the deaths
of hundreds of innocent people — children, women, and the elderly —
and carried out strikes on civilian settlements. Even the capital,
Baku, was targeted by missile attacks from Armenia. Due to the
laying of landmines in our territories during the occupation,
civilians and military personnel continue to be killed and wounded
to this day.


We, the leaders of religious denominations operating in
Azerbaijan, during the Great Patriotic War and after Victory Day,
actively worked with all religious centers and international
organizations with which we cooperate to expose the war crimes
committed by the Armenian side against our people, as well as the
disinformation and baseless accusations it spreads.


We spread information worldwide about the crimes committed
against the civilian population of Azerbaijan. All religious
denominations jointly appealed to the international community,
international organizations, and religious centers, and issued
joint statements. In those days, as always, we stood united with
all religious denominations active in Azerbaijan, and shoulder to
shoulder, we supported our struggle for justice.


Even today, Catholics, Orthodox Christians, Jews, and
Albano-Udis of Azerbaijan, together with Muslims, surround the
families of those who died for their homeland with attention and
care and honor their memory with dignity.”


“For the liberation of Karabakh, which we had awaited for so
long, our children gave their lives in the name of Allah and the
Motherland, and bequeathed the victory won with their blood to the
Azerbaijani people. In the struggle for the liberation of Karabakh,
drawing on the values of tolerance and multiculturalism that have
long been part of Azerbaijan’s tradition, all our citizens have
united even more closely and demonstrated their devotion to the
Motherland.


Polad Hashimov, Mubariz Ibragimov, Albert Agarunov, Denis
Pronin, Yakovlev, Polovinko, Senyushkin, and hundreds of our other
heroes reached the pinnacle of martyrdom, giving their lives for
their native Azerbaijan. Their noble memory will forever remain in
our hearts and will always be remembered with deep respect. We pray
to Allah for mercy upon each of our martyrs who gave their lives
for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of our country, and
we wish our veterans a speedy recovery.







Today, we are extremely pleased with the large-scale restoration
and reconstruction efforts planned and already actively underway on
Azerbaijani soil to address the bitter consequences of Armenian
vandalism — the restoration of barbarically destroyed cities and
villages, historical and spiritual sites, as well as the demining
of our territories.


The sounds of the azan echoing from restored historic mosques,
as well as the restored and reconstructed places of worship and
Christian churches, are a manifestation of the tolerant state
policy of Azerbaijan — a country that values its spiritual values
and multicultural religious heritage as a national treasure,
revives and carefully preserves it.


Our state, while preserving the Armenian church in the center of
Baku, is simultaneously restoring Orthodox and Armenian churches in
Shusha alongside our mosques. This is a vivid manifestation of the
care and patronage of the Azerbaijani people and state toward
spiritual values.”


The primary goal of us, religious leaders, is to remind people
of the lessons of history so that we may prevent wars, the deaths
of innocent people, terrorist acts, and conflicts in the
future.


To this end, on Remembrance Day, September 27, which is
inscribed in our history as the beginning of the path to the Great
Victory, we ask the Almighty to bestow His mercy upon our heroic
martyrs.


May the Almighty protect the Azerbaijani state and people and
always grant them victory! May the Almighty help us establish peace
and justice throughout the world! Amen!”


Chairman of the Caucasus Muslim Board, Sheikh-ul-Islam
Allahshukur Pashazade


Chairman of the Mountain Jewish Religious Community, Milikh
Yevdayev


Bishop Alexy of the Baku and Azerbaijan Diocese of the Russian
Orthodox Church, Alexiy Smirnov


Chairman of the Albanian-Udi Religious Community, Robert
Mobili


Vicar General of the Apostolic Prefecture of the Catholic Church
in Azerbaijan, Josef Marek


Chairman of the Baku Religious Community of Sephardic Jews,
Zamir Isayev


Deputy Chairman of the Religious Community of European Jews,
Evgeny Brenneysen.