New mass grave discovered in Khojaly, say Azerbaijani authorities

By Burc Eruygur

ISTANBUL (AA) - Azerbaijan said on Friday that it received information on the discovery of a new mass grave in the town of Khojaly in the country's Karabakh region.

A statement by Azerbaijan's Prosecutor General's Office said its district office in Khojaly received information on Wednesday about human remains discovered during excavations in the city center near a former carpet factory.

The dig was conducted as part of restoration and construction efforts in Khojaly, the statement said, adding that a team from the office, other government bodies, and the Azerbaijan delegation of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) was forwarded the location.

The statement further noted that the investigation discovered bone fragments, which were then collected for laboratory examination and expert analysis.

"As a result of the procedural actions carried out until now, the human remains discovered in the area belong to at least four people (one of them, presumably, a 4-5-year-old child); it was determined that they were being tortured, tied with ropes, and buried at least 25 years ago," it added.

The criminal department of the Prosecutor General's Office has launched a full investigation into the incident, with updates to be publicly available.

The Karabakh region had been the site of mass killings and burials since the First Karabakh War in the early 1990s, during which the Armenian military occupied Nagorno-Karabakh — a territory internationally recognized as part of Azerbaijan — and seven adjacent regions, including Khojaly.

The town was the site of a two-hour Armenian offensive that killed 613 Azerbaijani civilians — including 106 women, 63 children, and 70 elderly people — and seriously injured 487 others, according to Azerbaijani figures.

Some 150 of the 1,275 Azerbaijanis that the Armenians captured during what has now been called the Khojaly massacre remain missing, while eight families were completely wiped out.​​​​​​​