YEREVAN, JANUARY 1, ARMENPRESS : Armenian foreign ministry said the Italian daily La Stampa carried a story in its January 23 issue by Flavia Amabile about the destruction of an old Armenian cemetery in Julfa, in Azerbaijan’s enclave of Nakhichevan.
The destruction of the cemetery in mid-December 2005 by Azerbaijani soldiers was videotaped from across the border on the Iranian side. The author of the story condemned the destruction of the cemetery as ‘ barbaric act” slamming the authorities of Azerbaijan, also the UN and UNESCO for their silence over this crime of cultural genocide.
The Azerbaijani embassy in Rome placed a retraction in January 30 issue, accusing the newspaper of disseminating false information. The January 30 issue also carried a story by Armenian ambassador to Italy, Ruben Shugarian, who cited a range of facts to show Azerbaijan’s policy of destroying Armenian cultural monuments since the early years of the last century. Shugarian referred to the letter by US Congressmen, European Union and UNESCO urging Azeri authorities to end the destruction of centuries-old Armenian stone crosses (khatchkars) in the historic Julfa cemetery.
This cemetery includes khatchkars from as far back as the 7th century and is revered as an architectural treasure. International concerns were raised in 2002, when hundreds of the khatchkars were destroyed in a similar manner by Azerbaijan. Nakhichevan is a historic part of the Armenian homeland and was an integral part of the first Armenian Republic of 1918-1920. It was arbitrarily severed from Armenia and placed under Azerbaijani rule as part of the Soviet Union’s accommodation with Kemalist Turkey and Moscow’s “divide and conquer” gerrymandering of borders to facilitate its control of the region.
During the Soviet era, the indigenous Armenian population was pushed out of Nakhichevan due to discrimination, economic pressure, and other policies advanced by the Soviet Azerbaijani authorities.
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