In 2020 after the 44 days of war the Nagorno-Karabakh problem was solved by Azerbaijan. Leaders of Azerbaijan, Armenia and Russia signed an agreement to end the military operations in the de-occupied territories of Azerbaijan. According to the provisions of the statement Armenia had to withdraw its armed forces from the occupied Kalbajar, Aghdam and Lachin.
Despite the agreement and Azerbaijan’s good attitude Armenia committed environmental terror even when leaving the territories. It is observed that, the vast amount of trees were chopped and transported from Kalbajar on large trucks by Armenians while leaving Azerbaijani territories. Armenians have been setting fire to homes built by Azerbaijanis. In this way they hugely damaged the environment of the region. Armenian forces also set deliberate fire at Shusha forest with the total area of 8,526 hectares.
Thus all actions have been continuing for many years in occupied territories. If we look at the international law, it is grossly violating the requirements of international conventions on the inviolability of the ecological environment and ignoring the normative acts of the relevant UN and other environmental organizations. Taking a look at the figures we can see that the total forest area under Armenia’s occupation was 247,352 hectares. Armenian side also cut down endemic trees which included on the IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) Red List. They sold it abroad. This is the barbaric policy that Armenia pursues.
We all know that the water reservoir is one the main core element of the environment. Unfortunately Armenia cut off Azerbaijan’s water during the occupation and left more than 100K Hectares of land without water. Moreover, the authorities in separatist Nagorno-Karabakh republic blocked the Sarsang reservoir from flowing to the Azerbaijani regions during summer while opening floodgates to these regions in winter.
Summing up all these actions, according to preliminary estimates by experts, the damage to the environment and natural resources is valued at about $265.3 billion.
Despite all these facts, the leadership of Azerbaijan started to restore environment again in Karabakh region. Nowadays the President of Azerbaijan pays special attention to planting trees in the liberated Zangilan and Fizuli districts, and he signed important documents for restoration of the ecosystem in the de-occupied territories.
To sum up, attitude toward by Armenia to the nature and the eco-terror in Karabakh and the adjacent regions of Azerbaijan not only a serious threat to the ecology of Azerbaijan but also, is the provocative actions, and serious threat to peace and security in the region.
http://eco.gov.az/frq-content/plugins/pages_v1/entry/20190823174831_88765600.pdf