Speaking at the public hearing organized by the Human Rights Committee of the Milli Majlis on March 3 on the topic "Crossing the Mountains: Peaceful and Legal Return to Western Azerbaijan", Committee Chairman Zahid Oruj said that "the refugee status of Western Azerbaijanis has not been canceled."
Fakt Yoxla examined whether this claim was true.
According to the Law on the Status of Refugees and Internally Displaced Persons, a person who was not a citizen of the Republic of Azerbaijan and was left out of the country of his citizenship due to a well-founded fear of being a victim of persecution due to his race, nationality, religious belief, belonging to a certain social group or political opinion, and a person who cannot or does not want to use the protection of that country due to the same precaution is called a refugee.
Western Azerbaijanis mean Azerbaijanis who lived in Armenia before the First Karabakh War but became refugees due to the conflict. According to the information released by the State Committee for Refugees and IDPs, in 1988-1992, 250,000 ethnic Azerbaijanis were forced to leave their place of residence and came to Azerbaijan as a result of the ethnic cleansing policy implemented by Armenia.
On the basis of the Law on Azerbaijani Citizenship, adopted in 1998, refugees from Armenia were granted Azerbaijani citizenship en masse. Paragraph 3 of Article 5 of the Law states that refugees who settled in the territory of Azerbaijan from January 1, 1988, to January 1, 1992, are considered citizens of Azerbaijan. Since that time, refugees who moved from Armenia to Azerbaijan have been granted Azerbaijani citizenship. According to Article 14 of the Law on the Status of Refugees and Internally Displaced Persons, refugees who receive Azerbaijani citizenship lose their refugee status.
After the refugees who came to Azerbaijan from Armenia were granted citizenship in 1999, their names were removed from the list of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees. According to the latest information, there are currently 6,466 people with refugee status in Azerbaijan, 92 percent of whom are of Ukrainian and Afghan origin.
Fakt Yoxla concludes that Zahid Oruj's claim is False.
