Ocampo's report distorts real situation on ground Azerbaijani presidential aide replies to AP

Assistant to the President of Azerbaijan - Head of the Foreign Policy Department of the Presidential Administration Hikmat Hajiyev rejected the report of the former Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court Luis Moreno Ocampo.

Hajiyev told The Associated Press that Ocampo's report “contains unsubstantiated allegations and accusations”, according to Caliber.Az.

“It is biased and distorts the real situation on the ground and represents serious factual, legal and substantive errors,” Hikmat Hajiyev, an assistant to Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev, told The Associated Press, on August 9.

The former chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court warned that Azerbaijan is preparing “genocide” against ethnic Armenians in its Karabakh region and called for the UN Security Council to bring the matter before the international tribunal.

A report by Luis Moreno Ocampo issued on August 8 said “Azerbaijan’s blockade” of the only road leading from Armenia to Karabakh seriously impedes food, medical supplies and other essentials to the region of about 120,000 people.

“There is a reasonable basis to believe that a genocide is being committed,” Ocampo’s report said, noting that a UN convention defines genocide as including “deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction.”

“There are no crematories and there are no machete attacks. Starvation is the invisible genocide weapon. Without immediate dramatic change, this group of Armenians will be destroyed in a few weeks,” the report said.

According to recent video footage, another group of ethnic Armenians from Azerbaijan’s Karabakh region passed freely through the Lachin border checkpoint.

After going through the required procedure, they passed freely through the checkpoint. The video clips once again testify to the absence of any obstacles or difficulties in the passage of the Karabakh Armenians through the Lachin border checkpoint.