The Armenia-Azerbaijan Civil Peace Platform released statement on Armenian women's appeal to Azerbaijani women on September 18, Eurasia Diary reports.
"The Armenian-Azerbaijani Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is one of the bloodiest and most protracted conflicts in the world. Prolonged peace talks and their lack of effectiveness have a negative impact on public sentiment in both countries. The absence of instruments for the settlement of the conflict, which for decades has been a potential source of the threat of the resumption of hostilities, poses a serious danger for the entire South Caucasus region.
The fighting clashes of recent years have been characterized by an unprecedented intensity and involve a large number of casualties both on the part of military personnel and civilians from both sides of the conflict. Many left the battlefields as partly or almost completely disabled persons. Huge losses also happened in conditions not related to combat operations.
In this situation, a special heavy burden falls on the shoulders of mothers, wives and members of these families. It is impossible to calculate the number of women still bearing the burden of bitter losses. And the bitterness of their loss can’t abate with time. No mother in the world can wish war and new losses. No woman will want another woman, even standing behind the front line, to experience the same grief and shock that she herself experienced.
The Armenia-Azerbaijan Civil Peace Platform, whose goal is to organize public support for the peaceful settlement of the Armenian-Azerbaijani Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and ensure lasting reconciliation between the two peoples, highly appreciates the role of women in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict settlement process and considers it important for guaranteeing security, early recovery and reconciliation. The wife of the Prime Minister of Armenia Anna Hakobyan urged the Azerbaijani women to join the peace campaign aimed at ending the war.
We are sure that Azerbaijani mothers also do not want war and wish peace on their land.
The Armenia-Azerbaijan Civil Peace Platform calls on the women of Armenia and Azerbaijan to join all peace initiatives aimed at ensuring an early and fair peace between Armenia and Azerbaijan and the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict in accordance with the territorial integrity, internationally recognized borders and the sovereignty of both countries, in accordance with international law and the four resolutions of the UN Security Council, adopted regarding this conflict, and make every effort not to expose dangers to the lives of their sons.
Armenia-Azerbaijan Civil Peace Platform makes efforts to create conditions for everyone who is ready to contribute to the maintenance of peace and security, and calls for joint efforts to restore peace and good-neighborliness between our peoples."
Meanwhile, about fourty Armenian women who lost their family members during the Nagorno-Karabakh war joined to the Armenian PM's wife, Anna Hakopyan's "Women for Peace" initiative. They called on Azerbaijani women to join them in order to end the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict.
