Trucks operated by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) entered Karabakh in Azerbaijan on Monday. Baku said they agreed on the transfer and countered Armenia's claims that Azerbaijan was causing a humanitarian crisis by blocking a road linking the region to Armenia. Karabakh was retaken by Azerbaijan after a 2020 war against Armenia, which seized the territory in the early 1990s following the collapse of the Soviet regime.
Hikmet Hajiyev, a senior adviser to Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, tweeted that they ensured simultaneous passage of ICRC trucks from the roads linking Agham and Khankandi and Lachin and Khankandi and that the roads were open and functional. "It is the principled, just, legitimate and irreversible position of Azerbaijan. The whole international community once again witnessed that there was no so-called blockade but deliberate self-blockade, weaponization and politicization of humanitarian issues and theatrical dramas by Armenia and illegal puppet regime, lobby groups and some Western corrupt politicians and biased media to mislead, manipulate and confuse. The masks are torn off while the reality remains. There is no place for gray zones in Azerbaijan," Hajiyev tweeted. "Unfortunately, notwithstanding the reached agreements as well as the calls of international partners, Armenia and the puppet regime it created in the Karabakh region prevented implementation of such passage," Azerbaijan's Foreign Ministry spokesperson Aykhan Hajizada said. Hajizada said that the proposal for parallel use of two roads in coordination with Azerbaijan has been promoted for a long time and was widely discussed at various levels.
Azerbaijan has long rejected the accusations of Armenia and argued that Karabakh could receive all the supplies it needed via Azerbaijan, adding that "separatists" refused their proposal to simultaneously reopen both the Lachin corridor and the Aghdam road, which connects Karabakh with the rest of Azerbaijan.
The International Committee of the Red Cross said that thanks to "a humanitarian consensus between the decision-makers, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) is today bringing shipments of wheat flour and essential medical items to people in need via the Lachin Corridor and the Aghdam road." Karabakh residents "urgently need sustained relief through regular humanitarian shipments. This consensus has allowed our teams to resume this lifesaving work," said Ariane Bauer, ICRC's regional director for Europe and Central Asia.
Azerbaijan and the Karabakh separatist administration agreed to simultaneously reopen the two roads earlier this month. The Lachin road, which connects Armenia and Karabakh, did not immediately reopen, with Armenian and French aid convoys continuing to sit idle at the beginning of the corridor.
