Nearly 4,000 Azerbaijanis Missing Due to Armenia’s Military Aggression

As many as 3,983 people have been registered as missing due to Armenia’s military aggression against Azerbaijan, the State Commission for Prisoners of War, Hostages, and Missing Persons reported on Monday.

The staggering number includes 3,209 military personnel and 774 civilians.

Of the total, 3,977 individuals went missing during the First Karabakh War in the 1990s, and six people disappeared during the 44-day Patriotic War in 2020, Secretary of the State Commission Gazanfar Ahmadov said.

“3,698 of the missing persons are men, while 285 are women. Additionally, 1,702 individuals, including 419 military personnel, have been registered as freed captives and hostages by the State Commission,” Ahmadov said, during the presentation ceremony of the International Commission on Missing Persons (ICMP) assessment report on the search for missing persons in Azerbaijan.

The Commission has been working extensively to identify the burial sites of missing citizens in the liberated territories after the 2020 war and 2023 anti-terrorist campaign in the Karabakh region.

Since February 2021, a large-scale search, excavation, and forensic identification process has been underway in these areas. According to the latest findings, the remains belonging to 688 missing persons have been discovered, including the remains of 187 individuals in 23 mass graves.

The forensic molecular-genetic examinations conducted on these remains resulted in the identification of 165 individuals missing since the First Karabakh War in 1991-1994. Their identities have been disclosed, and the remains handed over to their families.

At the presentation on Monday, Sharafat Hasanov, Deputy Head of the State Security Service, said since 1988, Azerbaijan has been drawn into an armed conflict due to Armenia's unfounded territorial claims and occupation, resulting in a large-scale humanitarian disaster reflected in the deaths or disappearance of over 19,000 Azerbaijani citizens and injuries of more than 65,000 people. 

The investigation by the State Security Service has established torture as the main cause of deaths of 170 Azerbaijani prisoners in Armenia.

The Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict emerged in late 1980s with anti-Azerbaijan sentiments in Armenia. It escalated into armed intervention in Azerbaijan’s internationally recognized territories, including the Karabakh region. A bloody war ended with a ceasefire in 1994 and saw Armenia occupying 20 percent of Azerbaijan’s sovereign territory. Over 20,000 Azerbaijanis were killed and one million were expelled from those lands in a brutal ethnic cleansing campaign conducted by Armenia.

On September 27, 2020, the longstanding conflict reignited when Armenia’s forces, stationed illegally in occupied Azerbaijani lands, attacked military positions and civilian settlements of Azerbaijan. In a 44-day counterattack, Azerbaijani forces liberated more than 300 settlements, including the cities of Jabrayil, Fuzuli, Zangilan, Gubadli, and Shusha, from Armenian occupation. The war concluded on November 10, 2020, with a tripartite statement signed by Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Russia. Under this agreement, Armenia returned the occupied Aghdam, Kalbajar, and Lachin districts to Azerbaijan.

Since the launch of large-scale search operations in the liberated territories in 2021, the remains of 688 individuals have been uncovered, including those in mass graves discovered in various locations. These graves were discovered in the villages of Bashlibel (Kalbajar), Edilli (Khojavand), Farrukh (Khojaly), Sarijali (Aghdam), Seyidahmadli (Fuzuli region), as well as near Shusha prison and other settlements.

Historians and analysts in Baku believe that more mass graves of Azerbaijanis killed by Armenian forces could be found in multiple locations in the liberated territories.