Karabakh region on the cusp of the housing boom  Great Return underway

For the third year, Azerbaijan, in accordance with the program for the revival of the territories liberated from the occupation, has been carrying out a large-scale restoration of the transport, energy, and communal infrastructure of the region, creating industrial clusters. Active preparations for the reception of former internally displaced persons are being carried out in Shusha, Zangilan, and Aghdam districts. Currently, this work is being accelerated in the Fuzuli district, where housing construction will soon start in the administrative center and a number of villages.

New prospects for the development of this and other areas were discussed the day before at the Fuzuli International Airport, where a meeting of the working group on urban planning, operating under the interdepartmental center of the Coordination Headquarters, took place.

Over the past two years, the key focus of the investment strategy of the Azerbaijani government has been the restoration of the Karabakh and East Zangazur economic regions. According to estimates of Tair Mirkishili, chairman of the Milli Majlis Committee on Economic Policy, Industry, and Entrepreneurship, about 6.5 billion manats has been spent from the state budget to restore the territories liberated from occupation by the beginning of this year. Owing to such impressive financial injections, in a relatively short period of time, colossal work on the construction of roads, bridges and tunnels, power lines, and substations was carried out in the region, and water, sewage, and other utility systems were restored, and mobile communication, Internet, radio and television broadcasting networks were installed and railways were built.

Capital-intensive reconstruction work will continue this year and next, and housing and social construction will be stepped up alongside primary infrastructure restoration projects to accelerate the return of Azerbaijani citizens to their homelands. "Azerbaijan carries out large-scale restoration work in the liberated territories at the expense of its own financial resources, and in 2023 we plan to allocate for this purpose at least $1.7 billion", President Ilham Aliyev said recently. The head of state stressed that new towns and villages in the liberated areas are being built from scratch, using modern urban planning solutions and the concept of "smart city" and "smart village". As President Aliyev noted, it is a unique and unprecedented model of post-conflict reconstruction and development of territories under the direct leadership of the country's authorities.

The logical continuation of this activity will be the construction of residential and social infrastructure in the Fuzuli district. This was discussed at a meeting of the working group on urban development, which operates under the interdepartmental centre of the Coordination Headquarters, held the day before at the Fuzuli International Airport.

"In the coming months, construction work will begin in the villages Dovlatyarli, Dedeli and Pirahmadli in Fuzuli district, while design documentation is being prepared for seven more villages in the area, which will be restored by 2026," said Namig Gummatov, first deputy chairman of the State Committee for Urban Planning and Architecture, during a meeting of the working group. Over the next three years, 2,326 flats in multi-apartment buildings will be built in the administrative centre of Fuzuli district and 3,352 private homes in nearby villages, he said. He went on to say that a total of 399 private houses will be built in 2023, 447 in 2024, 2,317 in 2025, and 2,515 in 2026. Including in 2024, 2,904 people will be resettled in the 846-apartment multi-storey housing complex being built by the State Housing Construction Agency of Azerbaijan.

As a reminder, in March this year, the Cabinet of Ministers adopted a resolution approving a master plan for Fuzuli city development until 2040. According to the general plan, the total length of the city road and street network will be 87.5 km. The design work on the 18-km section has been completed and submitted to the State Examination Department of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, and after the examination, the construction of the urban road network will be launched in late April. It is noteworthy that last year 1,536 hectares of land in the district were cleared of mines and unexploded ordnance, thus creating conditions for the commencement of construction works. It should be reminded that in due time the Armenian occupants built several strongholds with a high density of minefields in the Fuzuli region. Clearing these dangerous areas continues, and in the near future, it is planned to secure an area of 2,620 hectares.

All of the above is aimed at returning the former IDPs to Fuzuli as early as next year. "Multifaceted work is being carried out in this direction, as it is necessary to speed up execution of other projects, creating necessary infrastructure in Fuzuli district for the return of displaced persons. For example, the construction of a central hospital will begin soon and the Ministry of Education will start building a vocational school. We're continuing to work to achieve all these goals," said Gummatov, deputy chairman of the State Committee for Urban Planning and Architecture.

It should be noted that the main objective of the First State Program of the Great Return to the liberated territories of Azerbaijan, approved by the head of state in November last year, is to accelerate the creation of public utilities and social infrastructure, construction of housing, development of production and creation of new jobs for the rapid return of the citizens of the Karabakh and East Zangazur economic regions. Particularly, about 3,500 flats and individual houses are planned to be built in the liberated territories by 2027, where 34.5 thousand families of formerly displaced persons will be settled in stages.

The relevant work has been going on since July last year, and by early March of this year, about 86 families (420 people) were already settled in the "smart village" of Aghali in the Zangilan district. Around 90 houses have been commissioned here and the number will climb above 200 in the near future. An industrial and transport logistics zone and an agro-park are being created in the Jabrayil district, where a housing stock for production cluster employees will also be formed. A major project for the modernization of the housing stock and the construction of new buildings is being carried out in Shusha, where the creation of tourist infrastructure is also planned. Recreation clusters will also be set in Kalbajar district and Sugovushan settlement of Terter district, where a tourist zone is being created and the business activity of the displaced persons will be involved to a great extent in the sphere of hospitality and recreation.

However, the most ambitious projects to restore the urban infrastructure are planned in the city of Aghdam and its neighbouring villages: residential and social facilities are being built here, and an industrial zone has been created, residents of which are already in full swing building production halls. "The first residents will return to Aghdam in 2025; apartment blocks and low-rise buildings for almost 10,000 flats will be built in the town until 2027," Gummatov said recently.

According to the executive director of the legal entity of public law "Rehabilitation, Construction and Management Service in the Karabakh Economic Region" Ovsat Hamidov, in the first stage five residential quarters in the city of Aghdam will be built for more than 5,000 flats, which will accommodate about 24,000 people. And in the long term, 42,000 people will be resettled to Aghdam and neighbouring villages.