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BAKU: Armenian lobby blocked Czech town's twinning with Khojaly: MP

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  • BAKU: Armenian lobby blocked Czech town's twinning with Khojaly: MP

    AzerNews Weekly, Azerbaijan
    April 1 2010

    Armenian lobby blocked Czech town's twinning with Khojaly: MP

    01-04-2010 06:39:48

    The Armenian diaspora in the Czech Republic has prevented the
    country's town of Lidice twinning with Azerbaijan's Khojaly, a
    proposal made due to both towns' being subjected to massacres, an
    Azerbaijani lawmaker said Wednesday.

    Gular Ahmadova said the initiative had been put forth by Elshan
    Nazarov, a representative of the Azerbaijani community in the Czech
    Republic. Azerbaijani MPs had been invited to the event he organized,
    and Ahmadova took part in it. Initially, it was announced that a
    street in Lidice would be named after Khojaly. However, the Armenian
    lobby hampered the materialization of the initiative.

    Ahmadova believes the lack of proper organization also contributed to
    the failure of the initiative. She said the Azerbaijani community in
    the Eastern European country did not make a concerted effort to reach
    the goal, and no assistance was sought from the Azerbaijani government
    and parliament members. Following the meeting, the lawmakers had
    offered their assistance to Nazarov.

    `I believe that in a year's time we will achieve realization of this
    initiative,' Ahmadova added.

    Armenia and Azerbaijan waged a war in the early 1990s. On February
    25-26, 1992, Armenian forces attacked unarmed civilians in Khojaly
    with the support of Russian troops. 613 people were brutally killed,
    while 1,275 taken captive, 487 became handicapped and 150 remain
    missing. Overall, the war claimed some 30,000 lives and displaced
    about one million Azerbaijanis. Armenia has been occupying over 20% of
    Azerbaijan's internationally recognized territory since then. The
    ceasefire accord was signed in 1994, but peace talks have been largely
    fruitless so far.

    Lidice, located just north-west of Prague, is built on the site of a
    previous village of the same name which was completely destroyed by
    German forces in the spring of 1942. On June 10, 1942, all 192 men
    over 16 years of age from the village were murdered on the spot by the
    Germans. The rest of the population was sent to Nazi concentration
    camps.*
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