VICTIMS OF KHOJALY TRAGEDY COMMEMORATED IN INDONESIA
Baku, 4 February (AZERTAC). The 18th anniversary of the Khojaly tragedy was marked at Bina Nusantara University of Jakarta, Azerbaijan`s embassy to Indonesia and Philippines reported.
Embassy officials gave detailed information about the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.
The dispute affected the entire Caucasus region and became one of the bloodiest ethnic conflicts, claiming 25,000 Azerbaijani lives and creating one million refugees, which represents about 14 percent of the country`s entire population and it is the highest percentage of any national population in the world living as refugees and displaced persons.
On 25-26 of February 1992 Armenian Army captured Azeri town of Khojaly in northern Karabagh. Over 800 civilians were butchered in cold blood. Late on February 25 the city was under the intensive fire from the town Khankendi and Askeran. The airport and neighboring houses were destroyed. More than 150 people defending the airport were killed by sporadic artillery shelling of regiment No 366. The next day, on February 26 the fire shooting grew heavier and fiercer. After powerful artillery shelling Armenian bandits launched a massive attack. Armoured vehicles of Soviet Army regiment No 366 were in the first row of the attackers. They were followed by Armenian armed bandit units. The Armenian armed men backed by armoured vehicles killed the defenders of the districts and houses. The most valuable property and personal possessions were loaded onto the trucks and taken away towards the town of Khankendi.
Occupation of Khojaly was followed with unprecedented brutalities against the civilian population. In a few hours the aggressors killed 613 innocent and unarmed people. Among them were 106 women, 83 children, 56 people were killed with special brutality, 8 families were totally exterminated, 25 children were totally, and 130 children were partly orphaned, 476 people became disabled persons (of them 76 were minors), 1275 people were taken hostage and even though afterwards most of the hostages were released from captivity, the fate of 150 of them are still unknown.
The embassy officials also talked about the International Campaign of Justice to Khojaly initiated by Leyla Aliyeva, general coordinator of the Intercultural Dialogue of the OIC Youth Forum for dialogue and cooperation.
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