Azerbaijan has sent a diplomatic note to Russia concerning the "illegal exploitation" of natural resources in the liberated Karabakh territory after a group of its officials were barred from entering the region, the country’s Foreign Ministry announced Sunday.
Baku has repeatedly appealed to the command of the Russian peacekeeping contingent in the region to prevent "illegal exploitation" of natural resources and eliminate its negative impact on the environment, but to no avail, the ministry said.
"According to the information obtained by Azerbaijan, illegal exploitation and looting of natural resources ... is observed, especially in the Kyzylbulag gold and Demirli copper-molybdenum mines," it explained.
"By the agreement reached, it was again called upon to ensure Azerbaijan's representatives' unhindered access to the mentioned mines."
The communique noted that negotiations were held between the two sides, and an agreement was reached on Saturday, but still, officials from Baku were prevented from visiting the area.
"Because the Russian peacekeeping contingent did not take any action, a pre-planned action by residents prevented the visit," it said.
Moreover, Azerbaijani ecologists representing nongovernmental organizations (NGO) early on Monday protested the said illegal activities on the Lachin-Shusha road. The activists have set up tents and are refusing to leave until they are permitted to enter the region where two mines are located, Azerbaijani state news agency AZERTAC reported.
The Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry’s statement said that Baku’s note emphasized it was "unacceptable to obstruct such a trip or to impose any conditions” and stressed the need for the Russian peacekeeping contingent to "strictly observe the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Republic of Azerbaijan in all its activities" per the peace agreement signed between Azerbaijan and Armenia in November 2020.
Previously on Dec. 4, Baku deployed a group of experts to the territory to investigate the allegedly illegal operation of Azerbaijani mines and the subsequent environmental impact, after contacting the Russian forces to discuss the circumstances of the group’s activities there.
The statement added that the note emphasized it is "unacceptable to obstruct such a trip or to impose any conditions," stressing the need for the Russian peacekeeping contingent to "strictly observe the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Republic of Azerbaijan in all its activities" per the peace agreement signed between Azerbaijan and Armenia in November 2020.
The two former Soviet republics have been at loggerheads since the 1990s over the control of Karabakh, a region internationally recognized as part of Azerbaijan but was illegally occupied by Armenia for three decades until 2020.
Baku and Yerevan fought two wars over the territory in the 1990s and again in the autumn of 2020 when six weeks of particularly intense clashes saw over 6,500 lives lost before a Russian-brokered truce ended the hostilities.
Under the 2020 deal, Armenia ceded swathes of territory it had illegally occupied for decades and Russia stationed a force of 2,000 peacekeepers in the region to oversee a fragile truce after the three parties ratified the peacekeeping mission.
Moscow is active in ongoing efforts to normalize relations and resolve the dispute between Baku and Yerevan.
The presence of Russian peacekeepers in the region has been criticized by the European Union and even ally Armenia’s Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian, but who later said Yerevan was open to extending their deployment for another 20 years. The EU also monitors the Azerbaijan-Armenia border through a civilian mission that became officially operational on Oct. 20.
