ICRC-Armenia tandem: Manifestation of rampant indifference, crime and religious segregation

On August 17, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) released an animated video, the main idea of which is that families of the missing have the right to know the fate of their relatives and their whereabouts. Finding out their fates is one aspect of the ICRC's mission, and in our region, it is the international humanitarian organisation's primary task. It is a touching, humane video. If it were not for one thing: sensitivity and responsiveness and, perhaps, most importantly, the impartiality of the Red Cross staff, so beautifully stated in the video, is not always manifested in reality.

In any case, the humanity and impartiality declared by the organisation towards Azerbaijan are not particularly noticeable. Or our country is somehow unlucky with this, but the ICRC is extremely reluctant, sluggish, and lazy in searching for missing Azerbaijanis. Unlike, it must be said, the other side, and indeed the instigators of the Karabakh conflict - the Armenians. The Red Cross is very much concerned about their fate, and not only about the missing but also about the uninjured. It cares about their food, living condition, and health.

Why is the ICRC so strangely selective, why did it not like Azerbaijanis who suffered many times more from the Armenian aggression?

After all, the fate of 3,890 Azerbaijanis who went missing during the First Karabakh War in the Azerbaijani territories occupied by Armenian troops has been unknown for decades. Armenia could certainly shed light on the whereabouts of at least some of them, but it keeps silent despite Azerbaijan's repeated appeals.

This issue is regularly raised by the Azerbaijani side in various international instances, it is practically part of the permanent political agenda of our country. In particular, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev once again called on Armenia to provide Azerbaijan with information on the fate of citizens who went missing during the first Karabakh war, as well as to inform about the places of mass graves.

"We have been requesting this information for almost two years, but official Yerevan refuses to share the data, thus associating itself with the criminal leaders of the previous regimes in Armenia," the Azerbaijani leader said, speaking at the session of the VI summit of the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA).

This issue was repeatedly discussed at the highest level during the conversations of the President of Azerbaijan with US Secretary of State Blinken, with the President of the European Council Charles Michel, and others. Both politicians, by the way, promised to assist Azerbaijan in finding out the fate of missing citizens. But there has been no special progress in this case.

Meanwhile, the International Committee of the Red Cross has been working in Azerbaijan for many years, since the 90s of the last century, and it would seem that all this time it has been actively engaged in solving various humanitarian problems. It would seem that this is the international structure, which at least now, after our victory, can do something to help.

In fact, that is what the ICRC was created for. And here is a real humanitarian tragedy - almost four thousand missing persons, whose loved ones pray to God day and night that they are alive. And if they are still dead, at least know where the burial place is so that they can honour their memory according to the custom. And the Red Cross not only can but should help in this.

But the ICRC shows indifference and inaction with regard to Azerbaijanis. Although its official website states that since its establishment in 1863, the sole purpose of this organisation is to provide protection and assistance to victims of armed conflicts and other situations of violence.

However, we must admit that the Red Cross is very active in helping and searching for missing Armenians. And it is even more zealous in trying to get the detained Armenian saboteurs and war criminals out of prison, fighting for the arrested to have a good and sweet life behind bars and for their relatives to be able to communicate with their "heroes" at any time of the day while they are waiting for the sentence of the Azerbaijani court.

The ICRC has also established by means of expert assessments the approximate number of Armenian soldiers missing during the 44-day war and is extremely concerned about their fate. According to the organisation's experts' calculations, 303 Armenian citizens are missing in action. The press service of the Armenian delegation of the International Committee of the Red Cross said that more than 1450 appeals from family members of the missing have been received.

It should be noted that even during the First Karabakh War the ICRC was ruthlessly indifferent towards our citizens.

Recently, the issue of missing persons has been raised with new urgency. It is connected with the fact that new evidence of atrocities committed by the Armenian military during the war and the occupation of Azerbaijani lands was discovered. The remains of 17 Azerbaijanis found in a sewage well on the territory of Shusha prison made even people with a strong psyche horrified.

Nails in the bodies of six people became clear evidence of the Armenian side's atrocities, i.e. they were subjected to cruel torture. At the same time, during the preliminary examination of the remains, bullet marks and beatings inflicted with blunt and stabbing, and cutting objects were found on the bodies of the deceased. Some of the bodies had been decapitated.

It is clear that the Armenian side is not at all interested in the fate of the missing Azerbaijanis in Armenian captivity being clarified and the disfigured remains being discovered. Such gruesome details, as revealed during the investigation of the remains in Shusha prison, prove the cruel, atrocious treatment of prisoners and civilians in the occupied territories by Armenians.

And this terrible discovery is hardly the last, but all of them together open the eyes of the world community to the crimes of "enlightened", as it used to believe, Armenia. People who died of torture were buried in common unmarked graves. And this also proves that Armenian fascism is a real phenomenon, substantiated by many facts and documents.

So why is the ICRC so cynically indifferent to the Azerbaijani citizens who became victims during the years of war and occupation, why such selectivity? Moreover, such attitude of the Red Cross towards our country, and our citizens is almost a regularity. In any case, this is evidenced by the ICRC's selfless loyalty to Armenia and rampant indifference towards Azerbaijan.

A vivid example is the destructive actions of the ICRC on the Lachin road, where the international mission tried in every possible way to please the local Armenians, who "suffered" from the Azerbaijani checkpoint to such an extent that the Red Cross readily provided its cars for smuggling contraband goods from Armenia. Besides, ICRC persistently and insistently tries to make a passage to Khankendi exactly on the Lachin road, stubbornly refusing to use the route from Aghdam.

Or maybe such rejection of Azerbaijan and its laws, indifference to the fate of our citizens is connected with some subjective circumstances, the influence of which we do not take into account? Why does the ICRC, contrary to all international norms of morality and ethics, demonstrate such silent barbaric racism, apparently based on sympathy for its Christian brothers, who are Armenians, and so indifferent to the misfortunes of representatives of a religion alien to them? Is it possible?

At least the thoughts are suggested, especially by some visual associations - crosses on board Armenian tanks and ICRC symbols on the vehicles of the humanitarian convoy of the international mission. And how not to recall the famous call of the Czech anti-fascist Julius Fucik, who died in 1943 in the Gestapo: "Fear the indifferent! It is with their tacit consent that all evil is committed on earth!". In Azerbaijan, this truth seems to have found a precise and applied meaning in the face of the ICRC.