The Territory of the Karabakh Conflict (Armenia and Azerbaijan)
Armenia and Azerbaijan: The war between Armenians and Azerbaijanians for the Karabakh region was one of the bloodiest wars of the former Sovet Union. Thousands had lost their lives, many were taken POWs or hostages. Nothwithstanding a truce in 1994 the sides still take persons as hostages on a regular basis. Together with Svetlana Gannushkina (Moscow) and Paata Zakareishvili I founded in 1998 the International Working Group for the Release of Prisoners and Hostages and the Tracing of Missing Persons of the Karabakh conflict. The work of our group has been financed since 1998 by the German ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Heinrich-Bцll-Foundation and Caritas France.
We work tracing missing persons, we work as mediator between the conflicting parties and we help former POWs. Several prisoners of war and hostages had been released due to our help. In 2005 our group organized a meeting of high level representatives of the Armenian and Azerbaijanian state commission on missing persons in Tbilisi (Georgia). In 2006 Svetlana Gannushkina and I spoke in the European Council Committee on Migration and Refugees about the situation on missing persons of the Karabakh conflict.
1.1 The current situation in the region of the Karabakh conflict
Little progress has been made in 2006 in solving the issue of the missing in Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia, although most of the missing disappeared in the early 1990s.
5551 persons aare still missing as a consequence of the conflict over the Nagorno-Karabakh region, including 4,604 Azerbaijanis and 947 Armenians.
The International Working Groups knows of six persons who in 2006 were taken as POWs. All of them were released after several days, sometimes weeks. However, former POWs from Azerbaijan have to fear to be put on trial for treason in their countries.
Detailed information on the situation of the missing persons and POWs in the region of the Karabakh conflict can be found in the report of the Rapporteur of the Council of Europe, Mr. Leo Platvoet.