On August 20, 2021 the website www.war.karabakhrecords.info that presents the Military Crimes committed by Azerbaijan, reported that Azeris have destroyed the bust of USSR aviation Marshal Armenak Khanperyants (Sergey Khudyakov) in his native village Mets Tagher of Hadrut region.

It is also said, that the fact of desecration of the monument dedicated to Marshal Khanperyants became clear from the satellite images taken in July of 2021 (Fig. 2). It should be noted that the satellite photographs taken before the war show that the bust of the Marshal and the MIG-17 fighter jet installed in the territory of the house-museum (Fig. 1, source) were intact.

The satellite imagery made in July 2021 by Google Earth indicate that after the war the bust of Khanperyants is missing, and his MIG-17 fighter is partially broken and thrown on the side (Fig. 2, Google Earth https://l.messenger.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwe.tl%2Ft-afRh6ze91x&h=AT3FAZdi2p4gsna-vgfA6gjD3mfmwSw927KHEqzugUHQILk5Z9BtLAIUDSOnRdsr5NTW1tmDEdD6VD_Mzf_ZEHtF4GTHZfSfhnLTGA3vpIFaYA6RBtsJzu8SzZAAHLgv7CPUiw ).

It should be reminded that the author of the bust of Armenak Khanperyants is the famous sculptor Albert Harutyunyan. The bronze bust was installed in front of the museum on May 9, 1980 with the participation of the Marshal's family (Fig. 3). The museum dedicated to the Marshal was founded in 1975 as a branch of the Hadrut Museum of Homeland Studies named after Artur Mkrtchyan.

The MIG-17 displayed on the territory of the museum was moved here from the city of Grozny in 1985. The machine guns of the military aircraft were used even during the Artsakh war, and earlier it participated in the Vietnam War.

Our response

In response to the destruction of the bust of the Marshal and the MIG-17 fighter jet by Azerbaijan, we find it necessary to recall, that according to the Hague Convention of 1954 for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict the harm caused to the cultural values ​​of any of the peoples is threat to the cultural heritage of all mankind, because each nation makes contribution to the diversity of the world's cultures.

According to the First Article of the 1954 Hague Convention, which makes the basis for all other international agreements, cultural value, regardless of its origin and owner, is considered to be movable or immovable property ​​of great importance for the cultural heritage of every nation, such as monuments of architecture, art or history, whether religious or secular. It is especially emphasized here that “cultural value” does not depend on the fact of its origin, is not limited in time, pattern and form.