Mr. President,

Dear Commander-In-Chief!

        The people of Azerbaijan are living the most glorious pages of their history. Under Your leadership, the Azerbaijan’s Army is writing a history – the lands of Azerbaijan, which have been occupied and trampled by Armenia for nearly 28 years, are reuniting with Motherland. I am pleased and proud that such a historic mission is led by You.

        Unfortunately, in those years passed, the international community at best has turned a blind eye to the fact of occupation of Azerbaijani territories by Armenia and has not differentiated between Armenia the occupier and Azerbaijan the occupied. On the contrary, when we demanded fairness and justice, the groundless attacks and pressures organized against our country have increased and thus, in fact, the norms of international law and the rule of law have been disrespected.

        However, with Your proper and courageous policy and determination, Azerbaijan’s glorious Army started to restore the norms of international law violated by Armenia and to liberate our territories from the occupation. Under Your command, our glorious Army in a very short time destroyed the enemy’s armed forces, liberated considerable part of our territories, strategic elevations, numerous cities and villages, being under occupation for nearly 28 years, and restored the control over 132 km long part of the state border between Azerbaijan and Iran.

        Mr. President!

        The people of Azerbaijan are inspired by the successes achieved and closely united around You. Every day all citizens of our country are looking forward to hearing good news from You about new victories via Twitter and at the moment, the attention of whole Azerbaijan is focused on You. I am hopeful that in the coming days, perhaps even hours, one of the pleasant and good news will be about the liberation of tearful Sarsang, a pearl of Karabakh.

        For me, the liberation of tearful Sarsang from occupation is as important as my life. I wish to reunite with Sarsang as a baby longing for his mother.

        When I was MP and a member of Azerbaijani Delegation to PACE, I put forward a motion for resolution in order to bring at the political agenda the problems of Sarsang water reservoir kept under occupation. We bore serious tensions for the approval of this motion for resolution in PACE committee, Bureau and the session and won the political war in its true sense. At that time, President of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan mobilized all political and diplomatic resources of his country and addressed to PACE President, Chairperson of PACE Group of the European People’s Party, and members of this political group and all Christian world through the Chairperson of European’s People Party. He called on them to defend Armenia and involved Western world and Armenia’s famous religious, cultural figures, sport players in these unjust fights. With Your instructions and support, the Association for Civil Society Development in Azerbaijan (ACSDA), under my supervision, implemented a large-scale project entitled “Voice of Sarsang” within the years of 2013-2017. We regularly informed Azerbaijani and world community about the political and economic importance of Sarsang reservoir and carried out broad-range of activities within the country, in Europe and America, in the international institutions such as PACE, European Parliament, and EURONEST PA. The adoption of PACE Resolution 2085 (2016) entitled “Inhabitants of frontier regions of Azerbaijan are deliberately deprived of water” was one of the main successes of the project.

        I was subjected to pressures by anti-Azerbaijani and pro-Armenian forces after putting forward a motion for resolution on Sarsang reservoir as a PACE member. Armenian side did not allow the rapporteur to visit the country and launched campaigns against her. Despite these obstacles and pressures, the resolution was adopted with a vast majority of votes and included numerous important provisions.

        The Resolution highlighted that Nagorno-Karabakh and other territories of Azerbaijan have been occupied and kept under occupation so far by the armed forces of Armenia, requested the immediate withdrawal of Armenia’s armed forces from the occupied territories, deplored the use of water as a weapon by the aggressor state, regarded the deliberate creation of an artificial environmental crisis as “environmental aggression”, requested the Armenian authorities to cease using water resources as tools of political pressure benefitting only one of the parties to the conflict, and underlined that the responsibility will be on the state of Armenia in the case of disaster in the reservoir.

        However, as You always highlighted, like other international documents reflecting the fact of occupation, the PACE Resolution 2085 (2016) entitled “Inhabitants of frontier regions of Azerbaijan are deliberately deprived of water” remained on paper and no steps were taken for the implementation of its demands. On the contrary, “a so-called case was fabricated” in PACE in order to perform slander and smear campaign against Azerbaijan, me personally and my colleague Muslum Mammadov.

        Following the adoption of PACE Resolution 2085, as a result of my appeal to You and thanks to Your support and instructions, the petition launched by ACSDA on the liberation of territories of Azerbaijan from occupation gathered together the people of Azerbaijan, world Azerbaijanis, great Turkish nation, each of its art figures, politicians, and sport players and became the second-most signed petition for the last five years in the petition platform created by US President Barack Obama. However, consequently… The world and the US remained silent.

        The will of the President of Azerbaijan and bravery of Azerbaijan’s Army once again proved that the international organizations which disrespect their own decisions and act in a biased manner based on the double standards could never contribute to the liberation of territories of Azerbaijan. This problem was resolved only by the President of the Republic of Azerbaijan, our Commander-In-Chief and modern and professional Army of Azerbaijan formed by him. Liberation of Azerbaijani territories, including Sarsang will be an illustrative evidence of the above-mentioned.

        Mr. President!

        You restored the pride of the people of Azerbaijan. You strengthened the confidence of the people of Azerbaijan in the future and united our people around You by liberating our lands from occupation. I bow to You like every Azerbaijani and extend my gratitude for this joy, cheerfulness, and confidence in the future You give the people of Azerbaijan. I extend my gratitude to the great Turkish nation who shares all of our achievements and expresses moral support.

        You will live in the history, in the memories and hearts of future generations as a brave, heroic, undefeatable commander taking back for the first time the territories of Azerbaijan lost for centuries.

  Long live Azerbaijan! Long live Azerbaijan’s Glorious Army and its Commander-In-Chief! Victory is in our side! Karabakh is Azerbaijan!

        Yours sincerely,

Elkhan Suleymanov

President of ACSDA

October 23, 2020