Great Britain sends £ 500,000 for demining Karabakh conflict zone

The UK has allocated £ 500,000 to support the demining operations in Azerbaijan and Armenia. The funds will come through the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), the British Embassy to Baku has announced.

This is the second financial aid of half-million pound sterling from the British government for demining the region. It will allow holding important trainings and consultations to ensure security in the territories.

In order to protect all the nationals living in the region, the UK calls on Armenia and Azerbaijan to sign the UN conventions aimed at ending the use of anti-personnel mines and cluster munitions.

Zakir Gasanov, the head of the Azerbaijani Ministry of Defence (MoD), said in his interview with the "Azertadj" outlet that since the start of the demining operations, about 21,000 hectares have been cleared of ammunition.

In the territories that came under Azerbaijan's control after the 2020 Karabakh war, people are regularly killed and traumatized by mines explosions. Thus, on June 27, Ilham Salmanov, a police sergeant, was blown up by a mine in the village of Ashagy Seidakhmedli, the Fizuli District.

Since the end of the Karabakh war in November 2020, more than 220 Azerbaijani citizens have been killed or seriously wounded by mine explosions, President Ilham Aliev has stated.