Khojaly tragedy remembered in RI

Azerbaijan Embassy in Jakarta organized a photo exhibition Thursday to remember hundreds of people who were massacred by Armenian troops in Khojaly on the night of Feb. 25 to Feb. 26 in 1992.

Khojaly is a small town in Azerbaijan’s Nagorno-Karabakh region, which is currently occupied by Armenian troops.

Like Indonesia, Azerbaijan, which is situated in South Caucasus, is a Muslim-majority state.

On Feb. 25 night 18 years ago, Armenian troops with the support of former Soviet Union’s infantry guards regiment No. 366 attacked the sleeping town of Khojaly and killed hundreds of unarmed men, women and children.

“It was genocide. Armenian troops killed 613 people, including 106 women, 63 children and 70 old men,” Azerbaijan Ambassador to Indonesia Ibrahim A. Hajiyev said in his speech at the commemoration of Khojaly tragedy at his office

Scores of students from Harapan Ibu Islamic school and their teachers visited the embassy to see the photo exhibition.

Many people in Indonesia do not know much about this Khojaly tragedy.

“It’s a tragic. We in Indonesia do not know much about this Khojaly tragedy. I have been trying to raise awareness about this event in Indonesia during the last few years,” Imas Choirun Nisa Fujiati, a Harapan Ibu school teacher who is also the national coordinator of the Justice for Khojaly in Indonesia, told The Jakarta Post on the sidelines of the event.

Besides photo exhibition, a documentary film on Khojaly was screened during the event.

Human Rights Watch had described the Khojaly tragedy as “the largest massacre to date in the conflict of Nagorno-Karabakh.

In 1992, the New York Times reported “truck loads of bodies” and published full details about how Armenians “scalped” their victims in Khojaly.