PACE rapporteur on Sarsang reservoir to visit Azerbaijan

/By AzerNews/

By Sara Rajabova

Milica Markovic, rapporteur of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe is expected to visit Azerbaijan on August 24-27.

The purpose of the visit is to prepare a report titled “Inhabitants of frontier regions of Azerbaijan are deliberately deprived of water”, according to a message posted on the PACE website.

During her visit, Markovic will have meetings at the Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry, the Ministry of Ecology and Natural Resources and Agriculture Ministry.

Markovic will also hold meetings with heads of local executive authorities of Aghdam, Aghjabadi, Barda, Goranboy, Tartar and Yevlakh regions.

Markovic visited Azerbaijan for the first time in December 2014. After visiting Azerbaijan, she was to visit Armenia, but the aggressor country and its supporters prevented the visit.

Elkhan Suleymanov, a member of the Azerbaijani parliamentary delegation to PACE earlier said the rapporteur's attempts to coordinate the visit to Armenia has been a failure since last October, as Armenia has yet to give its consent on this issue.

MP from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Markovic was appointed the rapporteur on the Sarsang reservoir last May.

Armenia mobilized all resources to prevent the appointment of a rapporteur and even attempted to hinder the position at the state level.

Sarsang, Azerbaijan’s highest water reservoir, situated 726 meters above sea level, was built on Tartar River during the Soviet times in 1976. Since 1992, the Sarsang reservoir has been under the control of the Armenian armed forces, and as a result, frontline regions have been deprived of water.

Armenia uses the water reservoir to subject the six regions downstream to flooding by releasing runoff from the reservoir in winter months, and causes serious damage to the agriculture of nearby regions by preventing water runoff in summer.

Azerbaijan and Armenia have been locked in conflict for over two decades. Armenia occupied over 20 percent of Azerbaijan's internationally recognized territory, including Nagorno-Karabakh and seven adjacent regions, after laying territorial claims against its South Caucasus neighbor that sparked a lengthy war in the early 1990s. The UN Security Council has adopted four resolutions on Armenian withdrawal, but they have not been enforced to date.