The following Joint Condemnation Letter has been sent to the Secretary-General of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, Hissein Brahim Taha.

Letter of Condemnation: OIC’s Istanbul Declaration and Resolutions No. 10/51-POL, 46/51-POL, and 66/51-POL Adopted at the 51st Session of the Council of Foreign Ministers

The Organization of Islamic Cooperation’s (OIC) adoption of the Istanbul Declaration on June 21–22, 2025, together with three resolutions reportedly initiated by Azerbaijan, presents an unprecedented legal and political challenge to the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Republic of Armenia. These documents are being instrumentalized to justify expansionist policies, whitewash historical revisionism, and amplify state-sponsored propaganda, thereby enabling violations of international law, including ethnic cleansing. This grave affront demands immediate and unequivocal international condemnation.

Clauses 20 and 26 of the Istanbul Declaration, along with Resolutions No. 10/51-POL, 46/51-POL, and 66/51-POL, lay the rhetorical and political groundwork for Azerbaijani aggression against Armenia’s sovereign territory under the false pretext of “repatriation.” They aim to legitimize and sanitize Azerbaijan’s ongoing threats, war crimes, and ethnic cleansing campaign. This deliberate misuse of legal language and manipulation of international institutions to justify unilateral territorial claims must be unequivocally rejected. It is not only urgent to repudiate the one-sided vilification of Armenia; it is essential to acknowledge the glaring asymmetry in power, intent, and conduct. Armenia is fighting for survival; Azerbaijan is openly advancing a Pan-Turkic agenda—strategically entrenching Western dependency on its fossil fuel exports while rebranding its international image through hosting high-profile events like the COP29, Formula 1 races and UFC tournaments. The international community must not enable, through silence or complicity, Azerbaijan’s broader strategy of threatening Armenia’s sovereignty and undermining its indigeneity.

Clause 20 places exclusive responsibility on Armenia to “remove legal and political obstacles” to peace, thereby absolving Azerbaijan of its continued threats of force and violations of international obligations. Since January 2025, President Ilham Aliyev has repeatedly stated that peace is conditional on Armenia’s full compliance with Azerbaijan’s terms, including constitutional changes and demographic concessions. On January 8, he went as far as declaring that “Armenia must be destroyed” for being a so-called “fascist state”—a statement that echoes genocidal rhetoric and lays bare that what Azerbaijan frames as 'obstacles' to 'peace' is, in fact, Armenia’s very right to exist as a sovereign state. On April 9, 2025, he warned that Armenia must amend its constitution or face renewed military confrontation. President Aliyev does not have a legal basis to demand changes to Armenia’s constitution, as constitutional matters fall strictly within the sovereign jurisdiction of each state. According to international law and the principle of non-interference in the internal affairs of other nations, any such amendments must be initiated and approved solely through Armenia’s domestic legal and democratic processes. While concerns may be raised in the context of negotiations, they do not carry binding legal authority. These threats have been accompanied by demands to allow the settlement of hundreds of thousands of Azerbaijanis into Armenian territory, raising serious concerns about coerced demographic engineering.

It is important to recall the historical context of the mass displacement of Armenians from Azerbaijan during the escalation of the Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) conflict. This background informs current demographic and political realities, particularly the sensitivities surrounding constitutional references and the demographic demands now posed by Azerbaijan.

During the late 1980s and early 1990s, Armenians in Azerbaijan endured large-scale, brutal pogroms—most notably in Sumgait (1988), Kirovabad (1988), and Baku (1990)—involving mass violence, killings, and destruction of property. These attacks, marked by systemic state inaction or complicity, triggered the forced displacement of an estimated 500,000 Armenians. This campaign of ethnic violence has been widely documented and condemned by international observers.

In contrast, Azerbaijanis living in Armenia experienced displacement largely due to rising ethnic tensions and some localized incidents of harassment and intimidation—not organized pogroms or mass violence. Their numbers are estimated around 150,000, far from the exaggerated claims of “more than 300,000 people” in Clause 26 of the Istanbul Declaration and Resolution No. 66/51-POL, titled “The Right of Return of the Azerbaijanis Forcefully and Systemically Expelled from the Territory of Present-Day Armenia.”

If Azerbaijan invokes the right of return for Azerbaijanis displaced from Armenia, then Armenians forcibly expelled from Azerbaijan must also be recognized as having the right to a safe and dignified return. Yet Azerbaijan refuses to acknowledge this fundamental right. Instead, it intensifies territorial revisionism by labeling Armenia as “historical Azerbaijani land” and backing the fabricated narrative of the so-called “Western Azerbaijan Community,” which falsely brands Armenians as temporary “settler colonizers”.

Even in the hypothetical case of such a recognition, the prevailing conditions in Azerbaijan categorically preclude any safe and dignified return. Azerbaijan is an autocratic state, with over 375 Azerbaijani nationals arrested in recent years for political dissent—many subjected to arbitrary detention, sham trials, and politically motivated imprisonment under abusive conditions. Dissidents have been extradited from Europe and Turkey, only to face persecution upon arrival. Meanwhile, 23 Armenian hostages remain in Azerbaijani custody, 16 of whom are undergoing fabricated, illegal trials in blatant violation of international law. Under such repressive conditions—and in the absence of radical reform, credible international oversight, and binding security guarantees—any proposal for the return of Armenians to Azerbaijan is not only unrealistic, but dangerously irresponsible.

In comparable international contexts, the principle that displaced persons may return only under the sovereign authority and legal framework of the receiving state—and subject to individual case review—has been consistently upheld. In Bosnia and Herzegovina, for example, while the Dayton Agreement affirms the right of return, implementation occurs under local governance, with each case requiring state approval. This provides a constructive precedent for the Armenia–Azerbaijan context: any return of displaced persons must respect Armenia’s sovereignty, legal system, and individual vetting processes. Attempts to assert collective or state-driven rights of return—such as those advanced through the so-called “Western Azerbaijan Community”—bypass these principles, undermine reconciliation, and constitute a dangerous precedent for territorial revisionism and ethnic manipulation. While individuals of Azerbaijani origin may have claims to past residence in Armenia, such returns must occur individually, through Armenian citizenship, and under Armenian Rule of Law.

These vastly different experiences had profound impacts on the demographic and intercommunal relations in the region, shaping the tragic trajectory of the conflict. This issue must also be viewed in the context of Azerbaijan’s broader efforts to dismantle the internationally endorsed framework for conflict resolution, as it was seen particularly in relation to Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh). The rejection of the OSCE Minsk Group—a body specifically mandated to reconcile the principles of self-determination and territorial integrity in that context—represents a deliberate departure from established diplomatic processes. More broadly, Azerbaijan has shown a consistent reluctance to accept international monitoring and oversight, even as it escalates claims over additional territories. In this light, the role of monitoring missions becomes critical not only in documenting developments on the ground but also in deterring unilateral actions. The European Union Monitoring Mission in Armenia (EUMA), originally deployed to observe and report along the Armenia-Azerbaijan border, should be granted an expanded and reinforced mandate to operate in contested and vulnerable areas. Furthermore, this situation calls for a comprehensive international response—including from the United Nations and other relevant institutions—that encompasses not only monitoring but also preventive diplomacy, peacekeeping measures, and robust mechanisms for upholding international law and safeguarding sovereign borders.

Moreover, falsely claiming that hundreds of thousands of Azerbaijanis were systematically expelled from the territory of “present-day” Armenia in clause 26 and resolution No.66/51-POL propagates a grossly unfounded historical narrative. This figure is entirely devoid of credible evidence and represents a calculated and significant exaggeration. The deliberate invocation of “present-day Armenia” is a blatant attempt to undermine and delegitimize the internationally recognized borders of the Republic of Armenia. Such rhetoric flagrantly contravenes established principles of international law, including respect for sovereign territorial integrity and non-recognition of territorial claims that seek to retroactively erase the legitimate status of a recognized state.

The Declaration also references the “rehabilitation and reconstruction” of what it terms “liberated territories,” effectively legitimizing the destruction of Armenian cultural and religious heritage in Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh). This narrative validates Azerbaijan’s actions while ignoring extensive documentation of cultural erasure. Notably, reports by UNESCO and the Institute for War and Peace Reporting (IWPR) have highlighted concerns over the preservation of Armenian heritage in territories returned to Azerbaijani control following the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war. Furthermore, the Caucasus Heritage Watch, an independent research initiative led by Cornell and Purdue University researchers, has used satellite imagery to document the systematic destruction of Armenian churches, cemeteries, and monuments, including in Nakhichevan, where the destruction of the medieval Armenian cemetery of Djulfa has drawn international condemnation (Khatchadourian et al., 2021). The issue has also been raised in the framework of the UN Human Rights Council’s Universal Periodic Review (UPR) of Azerbaijan, where NGOs and international observers underscored Azerbaijan's failure to protect cultural heritage in accordance with international norms (UPR Info, 2023). Moreover, a 2023 resolution by the European Parliament expressed concern over the fate of Armenian cultural sites and called on Azerbaijan to allow independent monitoring— a request with which Azerbaijan has not complied (European Parliament resolution, 2023/2552(RSP)).

The OIC’s Resolution No. 46/51-POL on “Solidarity with the Victims of the Khojaly Massacre” reflects a deeply politicized and one-sided narrative that unfairly attributes sole responsibility to Armenian forces while ignoring contested facts and evidence. Its labeling of these events as war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide lacks an impartial and thorough investigation. Independent observers and credible sources have raised serious doubts about the circumstances surrounding the tragedy, including the possible role of internal Azerbaijani factions and the absence of clear evidence of intentional targeting of civilians by Armenian forces. While civilian deaths occurred, the circumstances remain disputed. Armenian forces had announced a humanitarian corridor, yet civilians were killed in a combat zone under unclear conditions. Former Azerbaijani President Ayaz Mutallibov suggested internal Azerbaijani factions may have been involved. Azerbaijani journalist Eynulla Fatullayev, later imprisoned for his reporting, highlighted inconsistencies such as premature decomposition of bodies and doubts about who controlled the area. Independent observers, including Human Rights Watch, acknowledged the deaths occurred amid crossfire and found no conclusive evidence of intentional targeting by Armenian forces. By endorsing such legal characterizations without due process, the resolution fuels polarization and serves as a tool to advance Azerbaijan’s territorial and political agenda rather than promote reconciliation or justice. Its calls for recognition and reparations risk legitimizing punitive measures against Armenia while ignoring broader conflict dynamics and responsibilities.

In that regard, the Istanbul Declaration makes no reference to the humanitarian catastrophe in Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) between 2022 and 2023, including the blockade, forced displacement of over 120 000 indigenous Armenians, the deliberate targeting and killing of civilians, and the destruction of civilian infrastructure. Nor does it acknowledge Azerbaijan’s occupation of approximately 250 square kilometres of sovereign Armenian territory since 2021. Instead, Clause 20 fully endorses Azerbaijan’s interpretation of the conflict while remaining silent on its violations of international law and human rights norms.

Perhaps most concerning is the formal endorsement of the so-called “Western Azerbaijan Community,” a state-sponsored organization that refers to Armenia as “Western Azerbaijan.” Functioning as a mouthpiece of Azerbaijan’s expansionist agenda, it has now been given international recognition by the OIC. The legitimization of such an entity through a multilateral forum emboldens future acts of aggression under the false pretext of humanitarian intervention or the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) doctrine.

Attempts to distort historical facts, manipulate demographic narratives, and exploit constitutional references to justify border changes or military action constitute a grave threat to the international order. Such strategies risk normalizing forced population transfers, occupation, and cultural erasure under diplomatic cover. These actions demand an immediate and unified response from the international community, grounded in the principles of international law, accountability, and the protection of sovereign states from coercion. We therefore urge the OIC to revoke these incendiary resolutions and reaffirm its commitment to upholding international legal norms and impartiality.

Finally, in light of the OIC’s stated commitment to accountability among its member states, including Azerbaijan, President Aliyev’s statements reveal a troubling strategy behind the adopted declaration and resolutions at the 51st Meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers in Istanbul—one that demands urgent attention and concrete action. On January 28, 2025, Aliyev publicly declared that Azerbaijan had successfully forced the concept of the so-called “Zangezur Corridor” into international discourse:

“After our victory in the Second Karabakh War, this issue was brought to the international agenda and entered international terminology. Today, the Zangezur Corridor is a widely accepted term and expression. Of course, we are taking practical steps for the opening of this corridor.”

This statement demonstrates a clear strategy: to manufacture narratives, impose them through repetition, and coerce acceptance through diplomatic and military pressure. The international community must recognize this pattern for what it is: the systematic dismantling of the norms and laws that protect sovereign borders, human rights, and the peaceful resolution of disputes. For context, Azerbaijan claims it is entitled to the “Zangezur land corridor”, through Armenia’s Syunik region to connect with its exclave Nakhchivan. It frames this as a legal right under the 2020 Russia-brokered ceasefire (Clause 9), although the clause mentions unblocked transport—not territorial transfer or sovereignty.

Through a coordinated and multi-pronged strategy, Azerbaijan is actively fabricating a pretext for renewed aggression against Armenia. This includes the escalation of military provocations, such as the documented nightly firing on Armenian border communities since March 2025, alongside false and unsubstantiated accusations that Armenia has repeatedly violated the ceasefire. These claims persisted until early June 2025, despite Yerevan’s repeated offers to conduct joint investigations, all of which have been systematically rejected by Baku. When this strategy failed to produce the desired escalation, Azerbaijan turned to weaponizing the peace talks—introducing new conditions and unrealistic ultimatums that could later be framed as evidence of Armenia’s supposed unwillingness to cooperate. As Aliyev stated on April 9 2025, this would make military aggression “inevitable.” Particularly alarming are the unprecedented joint military exercises with Turkey—not seen at this scale since the lead-up to the 2020 war—and Azerbaijan’s accelerated arms imports, especially from Turkey and Israel.

Hate speech plays a central role in Azerbaijan’s strategy—dehumanizing Armenians and portraying aggression as righteous. Aliyev’s notorious remark, “We have chased them away like dogs,” exemplifies this rhetoric, echoing patterns seen in other ethnic conflicts to justify displacement and land seizure. Such language is routinely echoed in official speeches, school curricula, and exhibits like the Military Trophy Park.

Moreover, officials like President Aliyev have claimed parts of Armenia—such as Syunik, Vayots Dzor, and Lake Sevan—as “ancient Azerbaijani land.” This is not a call for peaceful coexistence, but an attempt to justify territorial ambitions through ethnic nationalism. All three areas are firmly rooted in Armenian history and culture, with no legitimate legal or historical basis for Azerbaijani sovereignty claims under modern international law. The Azerbaijani narratives labeling them as “ancestral lands” are recent and politically motivated, not supported by historical or demographic evidence. Armenia’s claim to Syunik, Vayots Dzor, and Lake Sevan is firmly based on international law and historical sovereignty. After the Soviet Union collapsed, both Armenia and Azerbaijan signed the 1991 Alma-Ata Declaration, agreeing to keep the existing Soviet republic borders, which placed these regions within Armenia. These internal borders had remained unchanged since World War II, making them long-established and stable. This principle, known as uti possidetis juris, is widely accepted in international law to preserve peace and prevent territorial disputes. The United Nations and the global community recognize Armenia’s borders accordingly, and Azerbaijan has no legal claim over these areas. Historically, these lands were never governed by Azerbaijan and have deep Armenian cultural and demographic roots. Azerbaijani claims are based on nationalist rhetoric, not legal or historical fact, and any effort to change borders by threat or force violates the UN Charter’s protection of territorial integrity.

Hate speech also fuels nationalist fervor that can coerce the opposing side into an early ceasefire, calculating that continued resistance would be too costly. Yet this same rhetoric corrodes trust and dialogue, destabilizes fragile ceasefires, and undermines long-term peace. Both Azerbaijan and Armenia are parties to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), which requires them to prohibit advocacy of hatred that incites discrimination or violence (Article 20(2)). Under the UN Charter, customary international law, and Article 26 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (1969), they are bound to pursue peaceful conflict resolution in good faith. The 2020 trilateral ceasefire agreement, signed by Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Russia, ended hostilities, mandated territorial withdrawals, deployed Russian peacekeepers, ensured prisoner exchanges, and provided for the safe return of displaced persons. Despite the terms of the 2020 trilateral ceasefire agreement, Azerbaijan has repeatedly violated its core provisions. Both states bear responsibility under international law for preventing and addressing incitement by their officials, while leaders may face individual criminal liability under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC)—to which Armenia is a signatory, but Azerbaijan is not. Amidst this peace framework, Aliyev’s hate speech is a strategic tool to consolidate power, justify renewed conflict, and obstruct a just, lasting resolution. This conduct breaches international obligations, destabilizes ceasefires, and threatens sustainable peace.

We unequivocally condemn the adoption of the Istanbul Declaration and the three Azerbaijani-initiated resolutions by the foreign ministers of the 57 member states of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation. This endorsement challenges the internationally recognized territorial integrity of the Republic of Armenia by attempting to legitimize the fabricated “Western Azerbaijan” narrative, which lays claim to most of Armenia’s sovereign and internationally recognized territory. Such declarations constitute a direct affront to the core principles enshrined in the United Nations Charter, the Helsinki Final Act, and other foundational instruments of international law affirming the inviolability of borders and respect for state sovereignty. We reiterate with utmost urgency the imperative for all members of the international community to uphold these fundamental principles, reject rhetoric or actions that exacerbate conflict, and engage in constructive diplomatic efforts grounded in international law. Only through such committed and principled dialogue can lasting peace and stability be achieved in the region.