NU rallies support for Khojaly massacre victims

Jakarta, NU Online
General Chairman of Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), KH Said Aqil Siroj (Kang Said) has called on Muslims to rally support for Azerbaijanis in the case of the massacre in Khojaly.<>

"Muslims must give support and solidarity as fellow Muslims to help expose the massacre in Khojaly," Kang Said said on the sidelines of a seminar on "21 Commemoration of Khojali Genocide" at the University of Indonesia (UI), Depok, West Java, on Thursday (28/2).

According to him, NU has rallied support by gathering lawmakers' signatures to give support to Azerbaijan, saying that the UN Security Council "has not reacted to the humanitarian massacre in the country."

Twenty-one years have passed since the Khojaly massacre, when 613 innocent Azerbaijanis, including 63 children and 106 women, were brutally killed on Feb. 26, 1992 by Armenian soldiers directed by current Armenian President Serzh Sarksyan, along with Russia's 366th armored battalion, as part of a bloody war over Nagorno-Karabakh between Armenia and Azerbaijan from 1988-1994.

Azerbaijanis around the world staged rallies to commemorate the 21st anniversary of the Khojaly massacre recently, along with a series of events organized in various countries paying tribute to those who were brutally killed in the worst massacre of the Nagorno-Karabakh war between Armenia and Azerbaijan.

Being one of the worst atrocities of the war, which left 30,000 people from both sides killed and hundreds of thousands homeless, the Khojaly massacre was commemorated in Azerbaijan's embassy in Tokyo on Saturday when Azerbaijani Ambassador to Japan Gürsel Ismayilzade recounted the tragic night of Feb. 26, 1992 to Japanese officials and nearly 50 citizens.

In an address to the press, Ismayilzade said that the Japanese government is well informed about the Khojaly massacre; however the public has very limited information about the tragedy.

"Japan has always been in solidarity with Azerbaijan, especially with regards to this issue. And we are trying to inform the Japanese people as to what happened in Azerbaijan back in 1992," Ismayilzade said, adding that Sarksyan, who was re-elected president following polls held last Monday, must be held to account for the crime he has committed against humanity. The commemoration ceremony was followed by a slide show of photos and a piano recital.

The Khojaly massacre was also commemorated in Washington, Ukraine, the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (KKTC), Sweden and in different parts of Turkey, with protesters calling on the international community not to tolerate crimes against humanity.

Editor : Sudarto Murtaufiq