Nepalese media highlights threat of mines and unexploded ordnance in Azerbaijan
Baku, June 6, AZERTAC
Nepal’s leading media outlet “Nepalkhabar” has posted an article headlined “Mines and unexploded ordnance: The silent threat in post-war Azerbaijan.”
The article, authored by the Embassy of the Republic of Azerbaijan—accredited in both India and Nepal—seeks to raise global awareness of the serious security, humanitarian, and development challenges Azerbaijan continues to face as a result of landmine contamination.
The article mentioned that starting from 1991, during the occupation and aftermath of the Second Karabakh War in September-November 2020 and throughout the post-conflict period, Armenian military forces have extensively planted mines in the formerly occupied territories of Azerbaijan, both in the Karabakh region and seven adjacent districts. Azerbaijan remains one of the most heavily mine-contaminated countries, with an estimated 1.5 million landmines posing a threat to over 13% of its territory.
“Since the end of the war in November 2020, nearly 400 Azerbaijani civilians have been killed or seriously injured, despite the country immediately launching extensive humanitarian demining operations.
Given the devastating impact and magnitude of the landmines, Azerbaijan has prioritized humanitarian demining of Karabakh and East Zangezur regions. While international partners support Azerbaijan’s efforts, more assistance is needed. To date, more than 200 thousand hectares of land have been cleared by Azerbaijan National Agency for Mine Action (ANAMA) and other operators, more than 180 thousand explosive devices, including anti-personnel and anti-tank mines, and unexploded ordnances have been successfully detected and neutralized.
However, despite the significant efforts made, international support remains insufficient. While Azerbaijan’s government funds approximately 95% of the demining operations, given the scale of the problem, contributions from international organizations and partner countries are not enough to meet the full scale of the challenge. More political and practical support from the international community is urgently needed to mitigate the humanitarian consequences of landmines and help clear the affected areas,” the article noted.
“Despite Azerbaijan’s repeated calls, both before the 44-day Patriotic War and during the post-conflict period, to provide landmine maps, Armenia for a long time denied the existence of such maps. After international pressure, Armenia provided some of them, but those covered only a small portion of the landmine-planted areas and were only 25% accurate. Over 55% of recent landmine cases have occurred outside the areas covered by these maps,” the article underlined.
“Azerbaijan has actively raised international awareness about the severe landmine problem in Karabakh and East Zangezur. In 2023, humanitarian demining was formally recognized as the 18th National Sustainable Development Goal in Azerbaijan. The country has been actively advocating to have it recognized as the 18th Global Sustainable Development Goal by the United Nations,” the article emphasized.
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