Nagorno-Karabakh: Genocide Emergency Alert

Baroness Cox Excerpts

Monday 2nd November 2020 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Cox]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the genocide emergency alert issued by Genocide Watch about the situation in the Nagorno-Karabakh region, what assessment they have made of their obligations as a signatory to the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (Baroness Sugg) (Con) [V]]

My Lords, as a party to convention on the crime of genocide, the UK is fully committed to the prevention and punishment of genocide as appropriate under the convention. We remain deeply concerned about the impact on civilians of the conflict in the Nagorno-Karabakh region and continue to call for urgent de-escalation and a return to negotiations.

[Baroness Cox (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I thank the Minister. For weeks, Turkey and Azerbaijan were preparing to commit genocide, and Azerbaijan continues to target civilian settlements, including a maternity hospital, with heavy weapons, cluster bombs and drones. According to Genocide Watch’s 10 stages of the genocidal process, Azerbaijan has already reached stage 9, extermination, and stage 10, denial. Will Her Majesty’s Government fulfil their duty to protect and make urgent representations to the UN Security Council to impose an embargo on the sales of arms to Azerbaijan and demand that Azerbaijan immediately stops all offensive attacks?

[Baroness Sugg (Con) [V]]

My Lords, we remain deeply concerned about the conflict, regret the lack of progress towards a peaceful settlement and, of course, condemn any targeting of civilians. There is an OSCE arms embargo in place related to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and we believe that that is sufficient to ensure that the international community is not inadvertently party to attacks on civilians from either side. We will continue to make urgent representations to stop all offensive attacks, both directly to the parties and through the OSCE and the UN Security Council.