Azerbaijan asks UN high court to force Armenia to turn over landmine maps

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (CN) — Azerbaijan has asked the United Nations' top court for its own temporary protective measures, following a similar request by Armenia last week. 

The former Soviet republic wants the International Court of Justice to bring Armenia to account under a treaty outlawing racial discrimination for the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh War that left 6,500 people dead. Lawyers for Azerbaijan described Nagorno-Karabakh as occupied territory while it was under the control of Armenia.

“The region was finally liberated last year,” Elnur Mammadov, Azerbaijan’s agent and deputy minister of foreign affairs, told the court in his opening statement. The disputed 1,700-square-mile area technically falls within the borders of Azerbaijan but had been under Armenia control for 30 years, following the First Nagorno-Karabakh War. 

Azerbaijan wants The Hague-based court to force its eastern neighbor to provide maps detailing where troops placed landmines through the contested Nagorno-Karabakh region. “The area is the most dangerous and contaminated landmine zones in the world,” Catherine Amirfar, Azerbaijan's lawyer, told the court. 

Landmine cleanup has already begun, but Azerbaijan claims it could take more than a decade to remove them all without maps of where the landmines. The country also wants Armenia to stop planting new mines and to refrain from any actions that would foster hatred and discrimination. 

Armenia denies it has done anything wrong and counters that the Baku-based Azeri government instigated the conflict, which broke out along the contested border in September 2020. Officials in Armenia's capital of Yerevan have countersued in a separate case heard last week. 

Under the 1965 International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, known as the CERD, signatories are required to take steps to end racial discrimination and promote of understanding between differing nationalities, races and ethnic groups. 

The landmines, according to George Washington University professor of international law Sean Murphy, were defensive weapons, reading from the Encyclopedia Britannica definition of landmines. He argued the placement of landmines can’t violate the CERD since landmines themselves are indiscriminate weapons. 

The Nagorno-Karabakh region has been a source of conflict since the fall of the Soviet Union. War first broke out over the territory in 1988, which left 30,000 dead before a ceasefire was negotiated in 1994. That conflict left the territory in Armenian control despite being enclaved by Azerbaijan. Thirty soldiers were killed when more fighting broke out in 2016.

Representatives for both countries will respond at the International Court of Justice on Tuesday.

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