SANTIAGO, Chile (Agencia Prensa Armenia) — The Chamber of Deputies of Chile issued a historic resolution which passed unanimously that condemns the “armed attack of Azerbaijan on the Nagorno Karabagh Republic,” on Wednesday, May 18. The resolution, introduced by Deputies Gustavo Hasbun Selume, Issa Kort Garriga, Denise Pascal Allende, Aldo Cornejo Gonzalez and Jorge Sabag Villalobos, sets a crucial precedent, since it is the first in South America that condemns the attacks of Azerbaijan and also call Nagorno-Karabagh a republic.
The Chilean Chamber of Deputies “reaffirms its commitment to peace and urges the Republic of Azerbaijan for the immediate cessation of all acts of war against the Republic of Nagorno-Karabagh and the strict observance of the truce signed by both countries in 1994” and “requests the Government of Chile to urge the parties to circumscribe the conflict settlement within the framework of the negotiations held in the Minsk Group, and thus avoiding a regional explosion with unpredictable consequences.”
“What Azerbaijan is doing undoubtedly marks a break not only of bilateral and international relations, but a permanent violation to the world peace and has to be condemned by the world, the citizenship and especially the countries like ours, that feel some degree of brotherhood with Armenia,” said Deputy Gustavo Hasbun Selume, President of the Armenian-Chilean Group of Friendship and the one who presented the project, said in an interview. “This will allow Chile to take a more active role in defending the sovereignty of individual countries.”
The deputy admitted that they received pressures from Naciye Gökçen Kaya, Ambassador of Turkey in Chile, so that this resolution could not be approved, like the one approved last year, in which the Chamber of Deputies of Chile sympathized “with the Armenian nation condemning the genocide of its people that began in 1915.”
“The Chamber of Deputies is autonomous and will not allow pressures from any country to come and say how we as parliamentarians have to act in defense of justice, peace, human rights and in defense of people being oppressed,” added Hasbun Selume.
“We welcome the courageous position of Chilean Deputies, who unanimously broke with the prevailing hypocrisy of not naming the aggressor in the conflict. We hope that this statement, in line with the Secretary General of the Organization of American States (OEA), Luis Almagro, on last April 3, will mark a path for the countries of the region,” said Alfonso Tabakian, director of the Armenian National Committee of South America.
