Delegation of int'l commission on missing persons to arrive in Baku PHOTO

The delegation of the International Commission on Missing Persons (ICMP) will arrive in Baku in the coming daysб Azerbaijani Ambassador to the Netherlands Rahman Mustafayev announced.

The Ambassador noted that the issue of clarifying the fate of thousands of missing Azerbaijanis is constantly at the centre of attention of the Azerbaijani president, foreign ministry and other competent bodies of the country, Caliber.Az reports.

"This is the most important humanitarian, political and legal aspect of the post-conflict normalisation of relations between Azerbaijan and Armenia," he said.

Mustafayev also said that in April 2022 the ICMP delegation visited Baku at the invitation of the Azerbaijani side to discuss the provision of assistance to Azerbaijan in search of its citizens missing during the war unleashed by Armenia against Azerbaijan.

Following the results of meetings in Baku, an agreement was reached that a delegation of this international organisation would visit Azerbaijan and carry out a comprehensive assessment of the issue with a view to providing concrete assistance in finding out the fate of the missing Azerbaijanis.

According to Mustafayev, the beginning of ICMP work and the visit of its delegation to Baku became possible thanks to the financial support of the Dutch Foreign Ministry.

"We consider this financial support as an essential contribution of the Netherlands to the normalisation of relations between Azerbaijan and Armenia," the Azerbaijani diplomat said.

He also added that members of the ICMP delegation would carry out a comprehensive assessment of the institutional and technical capabilities of Azerbaijan to solve the problem of missing persons, the state of the legal framework, the scientific and technical capabilities of the country in this matter, assess the degree of involvement of civil society, the media and especially the families of missing persons in the process of their search during the two-week stay in the country.

As the Ambassador stated, "the ultimate goal of the ICMP mission is to help the Azerbaijani side to reveal the places of mass graves and the whereabouts of the missing citizens of Azerbaijan, their identification by DNA with the help of the most modern technologies. Providing us with scientific and technical assistance in this process is extremely important."

"We also expect that this delegation's work in Azerbaijan will be - in addition to solving its main task - the beginning of active cooperation of the centres of forensic science and criminology of our country with the leading centres and laboratories of Europe, involved in this field," the ambassador added.

The International Commission on Missing Persons is the only intergovernmental organisation (established on the initiative of US President Bill Clinton in June 1996) that deals with the problem of missing persons due to armed conflicts, natural disasters, human rights violations, migration and organised crime.