HIN JUGHA

The largest khachkar cemetary in the world was located in Jugha (located today in Nakhichevan, Azerbaijan). The numbers were vastly reduced from the approximately 20,000 that once stood during Soviet times to a mere few thousand, and after independence, Azerbaijan began to systematically destroy them. After an international outcry, the destruction was halted a few years, until 2005 when the entire cemetary was bulldozed completely clear.   Click here and read more about Hin Jugha 

Hin Jugha:  armenian medieval cemetery, khachkars

"Azerbaijan: Vandalism as usual" "Азербайджан: вандализм как всегда"

The Armenian Genocide Museum Institute has published the illustrated book “Azerbaijan: Vandalism as usual” by Hayk Demoyan, which describes the barbaric demolition of the Armenian cemetery in Old Jugha in December 2005 implemented by the Azerbaijan army, Genocide Institute-Museum web site reports.

Hayk Demoyan
Director of the Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute in Yerevan

In December 2005 the soldiers and officers of the Azerbaijan army entirely demolished thousands of unique cross-tones and tombstones in the Armenian cemetary of Old Jugha completing the state policy of destroying the Armenian Christian heritage in Nakhichevan and Azerbaijan territories within the last two decades.

During these vandalistic activities the Armenian medieval cross-tones and tombstones of Old Jugha were turned into mass and thrown into Arax River. At present the shooting-range has been constructed on the territory of the cemetary.

Regardless of the existing numerous photographic and video undeniable evidence and proof, up to date some international organizations, including UNESCO, have not appropriately evaluated the vandalistic activities which were planned and realized on behalf of the Republic of Azerbaijan.

Source:

Азербайджан стал проблемой для всего мира

Если такое государство как Азербайджан отрицает то, что доказано многочисленными свидетельствами, фотографиями и видеозaписями, то это не только проблема Армении и Азербайджана, а также проблема всего мира.

Газета пишет, что такое мнение выразил директор Музея-института Геноцида армян Айк Демоян, одновременно сообщив, что именно это послужило основанием для публикации его иллюстрированной книги «Азербайджан: вандализм как всегда» на английском языке. В книге описывается варварское уничтожение армянского кладбища Старой Джуги руками азербайджанской армии в декабре 2005 года.

«От Азербайджана можно ожидать все: такая страна может даже спровоцировать мировую войну. В первый раз я коснулся этой проблемы в 2005 году, через 20 дней после этого случая, однако сегодня прошло 5 лет, и Азербайджан еще не получил соответствующего ответа», - сказал Демоян, подчеркнув, что данный шаг стал большим ударом для пропаганды Азербайджана.  

Несмотря на наличие фотографий, многочисленные записи неоспоримых свидетельств и доказательств, по сей день ни одна международная организация, в том числе и ЮНЕСКО, не дали соответствующих оценок действиям Азербайджана, организованных и осуществленных на государственном уровне.

Source:

Acts of state-driven terrorism committed against Old Jugha remain unpunished

Today, December 15, 2010, marks the fifth anniversary of the destruction of the historic cross-stones located at the medieval Armenian cemetery of Old Jugha, which stands as an element of world cultural heritage. On 15 December 2005, the Azerbaijani government organized an operation carried out by their military which, conducted in broad daylight, finally completed the decades-long destruction of around 5,000 unique and irreplaceable cross-stones located at the cemetery of Old Jugha in Nakhichevan, which is a historic Armenian heartland.

This Taliban-style act was not an accidental crime of barbarity but, rather, a state-sponsored act of cultural terrorism, outright genocide and conscious vandalism. The final act of this inhuman campaign against the legacy of ancient Armenian civilization was directed by the clear objective of destroying all traces of Nakhichevan’s Armenian belonging.

On the 60th anniversary of the foundation of Azerbaijan’s Academy of Sciences on 14 December 2005, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev issued a call for his country’s scholars and academic institutions to “prove” to the international community the “lack” of the Artsakh (Karabagh) Armenians’ historical rights to the territory of Mountainous Karabagh and to substantiate his thesis that “being guests and appearing in Karabagh only in the 1870s, the Armenians have no historical rights over the territory of Mountainous Karabagh.”

If, in the case of Artsakh, these “scholars,” who have become complicit in the large-scale propaganda projects generously subsidized by the Azerbaijani president, were compelled to accomplish their “task” by merely falsifying history in foreign languages—since the Artsakh Armenians had “cut the leg” of the genocidal Azerbaijani state—in the case of the Armenian cultural heritage preserved in Nakhichevan this legacy was a slap in the face to Aliyev’s false historiography and was making the millions of potential petrodollars null and void. Thus, the army of the aggressor state was mobilized to execute that despicable objective, resulting in the destruction of the centuries-old cross-stones, “killed” one by one, and a military facility was constructed in its place, on the very hallowed ground where the cemetery had once stood for centuries.

By this action, the Azerbaijani leadership has reconfirmed that the Azerbaijani state only continues to be a threat, not solely to the Armenians, but also a threat to world civilization, and that not only the Armenians, but their cemeteries and their history have become persona non grata for Azerbaijan.

Since 2007, and on numerous occasions since then, the Heritage party and its leader Raffi K. Hovannisian, along with Heritage party Members of Parliament Zaruhi Postanjyan, Larisa Alaverdyan and Stiopa Safaryan have consistently spoken out against this crime committed in Old Jugha before the parliamentary assemblies of the PACE, OSCE and NATO, and before other international platforms, and also to the Council of Europe’s Commissioner for Human Rights, insisting that a corresponding international fact-finding group must be sent to that region.

Jugha on GHN

Now you can find materials on  popular web site 


http://globalheritagefund.org/ (Global Heritage Network), 


which  represents  Cultural Genocide in Jugha

The Jugha cemetery was a unique collection of several thousand carved stone crosses (khachkars) on Azerbaijan’s southern border with Iran. But...


Between 10-16 December 2005 over a hundred uniformed men destroyed the Djulfa cemetery using sledgehammers, cranes, and trucks.


An armenian medieval  cemetery regarded as one of the wonders of the Caucasus has been 


erased from the Earth in an act of cultural vandalism likened to the Taleban blowing up the 


Bamiyan Buddhas in Afghanistan in 2001.

  Destruction of the statue by Taliban  
One of the two Buddahs of Bamiyan in 1976                                                                                                    After it was destroyed    




                                       

Armenian medieval khachkars. Jugha cemetry                                                                                                 December 2005. Destroying  of Armenian khachkars by azeri soldiers

  

Jugha's cross-stones and Buddha's statue don't exist anymore because of CULTURAL GENOCIDE

ST. SARGIS MONASTERY OF GAG CASTLE: THE NEXT VICTIM OF THE WIDE-SPREAD ANNIHILATION OF "ALBANIAN" MONUMENTS

 Years ago the Azerbaijani researchers made every possible endeavour to present the Armenian historical monuments located on the territory of the Republic of Azerbaijan as Albanian ones: between the 1970s and 80's, Buniatov, Geyushev, Akhundov, Neymatova, Mammadova and other "scholars" published a great number of books and articles ascribing the inseparable parts of Armenian culture such as Gandzasar, Dadivank, Amaras, the monasteries of St. Yeghishe the Apostle, Targmanchats (of the Holy Translators), Khachakap District, Northern Artsakh, Jugha Cemetery with its several thousands of cross-stones and even St. Sargis of Gag Castle to the Albanian people. 
    Indeed, the Armenians are well-aware of the fact that these scientific falsifications pursue a purely political objective: by attributing the Christian monuments that can hardly be anyhow connected with the Azeris' stock-breeding nomadic forefathers to the Albanians, i.e. their alleged ancestors, the aforementioned scholars aim at declaring the Azerbaijani people heir to this cultural legacy. Thus, with a single stroke of the pen, a good number of Armenian churches and tens of thousands of cross-stones turned into Albanian kilises' ('churches' in Turkish) and "khachdashes" ('cross-stones' in Turkish). Nowadays the Azeris have adopted another policy: they no longer make any attempts to attribute the Armenian cultural monuments to the Albanians: instead, they are busy with annihilating the very monuments once declared Albanian. 
    With the outbreak of Artsakh's Liberation Struggle, the Azerbaijani authorities drastically changed their policy on the Armenian historical monuments: disguising their nature of vandals and barbarians, they commenced demolishing the centuries-old monuments of Armenian culture throughout the Republic of Azerbaijan. We are, unfortunately, unable to determine the actual extent of destruction: we get information only about those monuments that are somehow seen from the Armenian side of the border due to their position, while the fate of all those located far from the frontier zones remains uncertain. 
   In the recent few years, the Armenian press has periodically written about the continual demolition of the historical cemetery of Jugha that began in 1998. Despite the repeated appeals, however, the annihilation of the necropolis with its over 3,000 standing cross-stones was not prevented: moreover, it was consigned to final obliteration in 2002. 
    Within a few years, the unique monument complex the Armenians had created with the sweat of their brow in their historical homeland was actually levelled with the ground, that being perpetrated in broad daylight, before the entire civilized world. We learnt about what had been committed only thanks to the fact that the cemetery was situated on the left bank of the river Araks, thus being clearly seen from the opposite, i.e. Iranian bank of the river. 
    Yes, the famous cemetery of Jugha was totally annihilated, but the Azeri vandals who are armed with bulldozers still have too much "work" to do since the Armenian land where they once penetrated abounds in other monuments built throughout many centuries. 
    In fact, at present we are doomed to witness the destruction of our own culture since the Azeri Turks are diligently performing the only role they have had ever since they made themselves comfortable in our historical homeland, i.e. demolition... Faithful to their mission, the Turks are at present "working" in St. Sargis Monastery of Gag Castle in the same spirit. 

Azerbaijan is being blamed for the destruction of a unique cemetery

A MEDIEVAL cemetery regarded as one of the wonders of the Caucasus has been erased from the Earth in an act of cultural vandalism likened to the Taleban blowing up the Bamiyan Buddhas in Afghanistan in 2001.

The Jugha cemetery was a unique collection of several thousand carved stone crosses on Azerbaijan’s southern border with Iran. But after 18 years of conflict between Azerbaijan and its western neighbour, Armenia, it has been confirmed that the cemetery has vanished.

The Institute for War and Peace Reporting, a London-based non-governmental organisation that supports independent journalism, said that one of its staff had recently been to the highly restricted site.

Destroying of Armenian khachkars by azeri soldiers

Where once stood between 2,700 and 10,000 intricately carved headstones — khachkars — dating from the 9th to the 16th centuries, there was only a dry patch of earth, said the institute (www.iwpr.net). It was the first independent confirmation of what Armenia has long alleged — that Azerbaijani authorities have razed the cemetery since the two former Soviet republics began a bloody border war in 1988.

The war ended in a ceasefire in 1994, with 30,000 dead and a million displaced, but still simmers over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh, which is held by Armenia but internationally recognised as Azerbaijan. Foreign organisations had been unable to visit the cemetery because it is in Nakhichevan, a tiny enclave of Azerbaijan cut off by Armenia and Iran and accessible only by air.

Azerbaijan has repeatedly dismissed Armenia’s allegations as scaremongering and in turn accused Armenia of destroying hundreds of Muslim sites. President Aliyev of Azerbaijan angrily dismissed reports

JUGHA ERASED FROM THE FACE OF THE EARTH

Tuesday, October 17th, an international delegation comprised of representatives of different National Parliaments and a Scottish history-of-art specialist, were received by Mr.Kotchiro Matsuura, Director-General of UNESCO, from whom they will be solemnly requesting an international investigation and open denunciation of the crime perpetrated on the memorial site of Jugha (Djoulfa/Julfa) by the army of Azerbaijan.

• The delegation was formed at the behest of the Parliamentary Group Switzerland-Armenia – mainly the Co-Chairmen – the National Councillors Dominique de Buman (Vice-Chairman of the Christian Democratic-Party) and Ueli Leuenberger (Vice-Chairman of the Green Party) – with the support of Mr. Charles Aznavour, Ambassador of Armenia to UNESCO. The Parliamentarians will submit to the Director-General exhaustive documentation on the subject, as well as a signed Memorandum in which five recommendations will be presented to the state of Azerbaijan, among which, the construction of a Christian memorial on the site of the old cemetery. If Azerbaijan did not answer these recommendations, the delegation of the members of Parliament will ask the exclusion of Azerbaïdjan of UNESCO with arbitration of the European governments, Switzerland, Russia and Canada.
  
  
  
  Moreover, the organizers of this exceptional meeting, regretted not assistance of the Armenian government.
  /Jean Eckian – Paris, France/
  On January 23rd, 2006, French deputy François Rochebloine (UDF),recalled in his intervention at the Council of Europe:[…] «We have