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Azerbaijani side prevents the entry of Armenian pilgrims to Dadivank in an attempt to disrupt ordination of priests

On April 25, the Azerbaijani side prevented the entry of 25 Armenian pilgrims to Dadivank where the ordination ceremony was foreseen by the servants of the Artsakh Diocese of the Armenian Apostolic Church, Artsakh’s Ombudsman Gegham Stepanyan informs.

“Preventing the entrance of the faithful to Dadivank under obviously false and idle pretexts, the Azerbaijani military aimed to overturn the significant sacred ceremony of the Armenian Apostolic Church,” he said in a Facebook post.

According to the Human Rights Defender, the Azerbaijani side thus violated the agreement reached through the mediation of Russian peacekeepers, according to which the Armenian faithful can freely enter and perform religious ceremonies in the Dadivank Monastery.

“Religious rights and freedoms are enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other fundamental international documents, the violation of which is an encroachment to human dignity, rights and freedoms,” Gegham Stepanyan said.

“Azerbaijan, which has declared itself a country of cultural and religious diversity, disregards the internationally known norms, insults, desecrates and destroys the cultural values of the Armenian people in the occupied territories, purposefully cleans the Armenian inscriptions and traces and artificially prevents the entry of the Armenian faithful to sacred sites,” he added.

The Human Rights Ombudsman of the Republic of Artsakh will inform the relevant international structures about this incident, urging them to implement clear mechanisms against the illegal actions of Azerbaijan.

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