The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe has resolved not to ratify the powers of the delegation of Azerbaijan.
With this decision, the Azerbaijani delegation has been removed from the PACE for at least a year.
The delegation of Azerbaijan may resume its activities in the Assembly when conditions provided by the Rules of Procedure are met, Ruben Rubinyan, Vice President of the National Assembly of Armenia said on social media.
He added that minutes ago, PACE voted not to ratify the credentials of Azerbaijan’s parliamentary delegation.
In the adopted resolution, the Assembly refers to the resolution adopted in June 2023, "Ensuring Free and Safe Movement through the Lachin Corridor," by which the Assembly confirmed the absence of free and safe movement through the Lachin corridor. The Assembly was struck by the fact that the leadership of Azerbaijan did not realize the very serious humanitarian consequences and the human rights implications arising from this situation, which lasted almost ten months. The Assembly deeply regrets that the PACE Rapporteur on the Lachin Corridor did not have the opportunity to travel to the Lachin Corridor as part of the fact-finding mission.
The Assembly also cited the situation in Nagorno-Karabakh, noting that Azerbaijan’s leadership “did not acknowledge the very serious humanitarian and human rights consequences” stemming from the lack of free and safe access through the Lachin Corridor, and recalling the Assembly’s condemnation of the September 2023 military operation “which led to the flight of the entire Armenian population of Nagorno-Karabakh to Armenia and to allegations of ‘ethnic cleansing’.”
According to the Assembly, Azerbaijan has “not fulfilled major commitments” stemming from its joining the Council of Europe 20 years ago.
“Very serious concerns remain as to [Azerbaijan’s] ability to conduct free and fair elections, the separation of powers, the weakness of its legislature vis-à-vis the executive, the independence of the judiciary and respect for human rights, as illustrated by numerous judgments of the European Court of Human Rights and opinions of the Venice Commission,” the parliamentarians said.
The parliamentarians cited a number of examples of “lack of co-operation” with the Assembly, including that its monitoring rapporteurs were not allowed to meet with persons detained on allegedly politically motivated charges, it had not been invited to observe the forthcoming presidential election, and other PACE rapporteurs had been refused visits to the country.
