International conference entitled “Khojaly Genocide, Crimes Against Humanity and Terrorism” co-organized by the Turkic Council and the International Hoca Ahmet Yesevi Turkish-Kazakh University, has started today in Ankara.

The international conference entitled “Khojaly Genocide, Crimes Against Humanity and Terrorism”, has started today (22 February 2017) in Ankara, to commemorate the Khojaly genocide, one of the gravest human tragedies of the modern times occurred 25 years ago in the Republic of Azerbaijan, and its victims, co-organized by the Cooperation Council of Turkic Speaking States (Turkic Council), and the International Hoca Ahmet Yesevi Turkish-Kazakh University.

Secretary General of the Turkic Council, Ambassador Ramil Hasanov, has inaugurated the conference. Prof. Musa Yıldız, Chairman of Board of Trustees, Khoja Akhmet Yassawi International Kazakh-Turkish University, H.E. Mikayil Jabbarov, Minister of Education of the Republic of Azerbaijan, H.E. Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Turkey, H.E. Elmar Mammadyarov, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Azerbaijan and H.E. Ahmet Aydın, Deputy Speaker of Grand National Assembly of Turkey also addressed the participants during the opening ceremony.

In his speech, Secretary-General Hasanov expressed that the Turkic nation did not breed hatred and hostility against any nationality, embraced other communities belonging to other religions and nations without distinction in every period in history and nurtured the culture of living together, stating that even the old Armenians in the Zangezur region, where he was born, acknowledged this truth. Secretary General Hasanov pointed out that the fact that more than 30.000 Armenian people are currently living safely in the territory of Azerbaijan is an important proof of this deep and proud tolerance of the Turkic people. He also stated that the peace and stability could only be achieved in the world with the proliferation of the concepts of tolerance and justice to other nations, especially to Armenia. On the other hand, he stressed that the Khojaly genocide is a bitter truth of the modern history of the humanity, and that the future must be grasped without forgetting the past.

Prof. Musa Yıldız, Chairman of Board of Trustees, Khoja Akhmet Yassawi International Kazakh-Turkish University, referred to the unilateral approach of the international community and leading international organizations such as the UN and the EU to Khojaly massacre and other crimes against Muslims in the various parts of the world and incidated that they did not place necessary emphasis and priority to such events. He also undelined that the tradition of knowledge, the spirit of unity and solidarity which Khoja Akhmet Yassawi represents was needed today more than ever.

Underlining that the Khojaly genocide perpetrated not only against the Azerbaijanis but against all humanity still lingers in memories, Mikayil Jabbarov, Minister of Education of Azerbaijan, in his speech stated that despite the Khojaly genocide, Azerbaijan did not breed a culture of ethnic hatred, but instead its education program has been based on tolerance, multi-culturalism, the principle of co-existence, and fight against radicalization and extremism. Minister Jabbarov expressed that the main motivation behind such conferences was to help bring into justice the perpetrators of the violence against the Azerbaijanis. Minister Jabbarov further stated that such projects as the Common History Textbook undertaken by the Turkic Council have been important for the Turkic world in terms of taking lessons from the history.

Minister of Foreign Affairs of Turkey, Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, highlighted that the main impediment to the security and stability in the Caucasus has been the illegal occupation of the 20% of the Azerbaijani territories by Armenia. Expressing that OSCE Minsk Group has been defunct in generating solutions to the Azerbaijan-Armenia Nagorno-Karabakh problem, Foreign Minister Çavuşoğlu underlined that the unacceptability of the injustice exposed in Azerbaijan-Armenia Nagorno-Karabakh conflict would continue to be brought into the attention of the international community within the framework of the Turkic Council.

Foreign Minister Çavuşoğlu further stated that while turning its back to bare facts such as the Khojaly massacre taken place before the very eyes of the World, Armenia rejects establishment of a joint history commission and objective study in the archives and is more preoccupied with the baseless allegations of “1915 events” instead. He underlined that the expression of the leader of Armenia about the Khojaly massacre “Before Khojali, the Azerbaijanis thought that they were joking with us, they thought that the Armenians were people who could not raise their hand against the civilian population. We were able to break that [stereotype]. And that`s what happened.” is a testament to the realities. Foreign Minister also stated that the international community started to give right answers to the Armenian lies about the alleged genocide theses.

After providing detailed information on the Khojaly genocide as well as similar atrocities taken place in various places of Azerbaijan, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Azerbaijan, Elmar Mammadyarov, expressed that their intention is to bring the Khojaly genocide into world’s attention to prevail the justice. Minister Mammadyarov went on by saying that for that reason Azerbaijan has continued its robust policy of bringing the criminals of Khojaly into justice with its “Justice to Khojaly” initiative and that OIC Youth Forum was supporting the initiative with various activities in 40 countries. He also noted that Khojaly was recognized as genocide by various parliaments in the World and that diasporas of the Turkic Council member states could implement similar activities under that Turkic Council.

Deputy Speaker of the Grand National Assembly of Turkey, Ahmet Aydın, stated that western World turned a deaf ear to such crimes as Khojaly and the ones perpetrated especially against the Muslims. He continued as saying that they should instead develop the same stance as they did against the terrorist events taken place in Europe. Deputy Speaker gave the examples of the slogans chanted after that terrorist attacks in Europe: “I am Paris” and “I am Brussels” and underlined that they should also be able to express “I am Khojaly”, “I am Ankara” and “I am Aleppo” when such events occur in these places.

After the opening ceremony, Panels titled “Khojaly Genocide: A Human Tragedy at the End of the 20th Century” and “Crimes Against Humanity, Genocide, Terrorism and Their Interrelations” started.