At the session of the Intergovernmental Committee of the UNESCO 2005 Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions, our Permanent Delegation expressed its protest against Armenia's attempt to politicize the organization

On February 1, 2021, the 14th session of the Intergovernmental Committee of the UNESCO 2005 Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions kicked off. Our country, which is the Vice Chair of the Committee, was represented at the session by the representatives of the Ministry of Culture and the Permanent Delegation of the Republic of Azerbaijan to UNESCO.

During the session, discussions were held on 18 items on the creative industry and the relevant decisions were adopted. Azerbaijan also proposed some amendments to several draft decisions, and those amendments were approved unanimously.

One of the items of the Agenda was the quadrennial periodic reports on the implementation of the Convention in the countries. In the course of this item, the head of the Permanent Delegation of Azerbaijan to UNESCO, Ambassador Elman Abdullayev said that mentioning in the report submitted by Armenia in 2020 the illegitimate puppet entity can be classified as an attempt to undermine the trilateral peace agreement, infringe upon the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Azerbaijan, threaten the rights and legitimate interests of Azerbaijani people.

He emphasized that there is no doubt that any attempt to politicize UNESCO is unacceptable, undermines the mandate of this organization, and impedes the implementation of the main activities that are at the core of its Agenda.

He underlined that Karabakh is this region’s only name and is recognized by entire international community as inalienable part of Azerbaijan!

“As a result of 44 days war Armed Forces of Azerbaijan in response to a new act of aggression by Armenia, have liberated occupied territories of Azerbaijan from 30 year Armenian occupation, thus fulfilling the demands of UN SC Resolutions”, said Ambassador Abdullayev.

Moreover, he brought to the attention of the participants, that recently, the jewel of Azerbaijani culture, hometown of dozens Azerbaijani celebrities, Shusha city was declared the Cultural capital of our country, which can be considered not only the cultural capital of Azerbaijan, but also of the entire region.

“I would like to remind everyone that the conflict is over and we should rather focus on post-conflict reconstruction and rehabilitation process. We have already launched the new projects on the construction of the “smart cities” and “smart villages” with the participation of the local and foreign companies, to revitalize the bygone spirit of Shusha and all lands, liberated by our brave army under the leadership of Supreme Commander-in-Chief Ilham Aliyev”, concluded the Permanent Delegate to UNESCO.

Afterwards, the representatives of the Ministry of Culture and the Permanent Delegation took an active part in the discussion of various items, presented the position of our country on issues such as the "Creative Azerbaijan" portal, ResiliArt Movement, creative projects, participation of the civil society and non-governmental organizations in the creative industry.

Thus, the 14th session has completed its work, and it was decided to hold the 15th session on February 8-11, 2022.