ArmInfo.The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Artsakh issued a statement on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of “Ring” Operation.
The message in the chat states: "30 years ago, on April 30, 1991, the Azerbaijani authorities launched the “Ring” Operation, which can rightly be called one of the bloodiest and most inhumane operations in the history of deporting peoples from their historical lands.
As a result of the operation, during which tanks, helicopter gunships and artillery were used against civilians for the first time, hundreds of Armenian villages of Northern Artsakh, as well as Shahumyan, Hadrut and Shusha districts were devastated and destroyed, tens of thousands of people were deported, hundreds were killed and taken hostage. The fate of many of them is still unknown.>
The NKR Foreign Ministry stressed that the operation "Ring" was another manifestation of the genocidal policy of Azerbaijan and a continuation of the series of Armenian pogroms and ethnic cleansing committed in Sumgait, Baku, Kirovabad and other Armenian-populated cities and regions of Azerbaijan, as well as in the settlements of the NKAO and Northern Artsakh in 1988-1991. The “Ring "Operation has turned the Azerbaijani-Karabakh conflict into a military one and has led to the subsequent full-scale aggression of Azerbaijan against the Republic of Artsakh, which continues to this day. "The war crimes and gross violations of international humanitarian law committed by the Azerbaijani armed forces during Operation Ring, the 4-day April 2016 war and the 44-day autumn 2020 war imposed on Artsakh by Azerbaijan with the support of Turkey and mercenaries from various terrorist groups are evidence that indifference and impunity for crimes against humanity lead to their repetition," Stepanakert concluded.