Azerbaijan’s parliament, known as Milli Majlis, has decided to halt all collaboration with the European Parliament due to what it perceives as “anti-Azerbaijani activities” by the European bloc’s legislature. This decision includes suspending cooperation across all areas and terminating its involvement in the EU-Azerbaijan Parliamentary Cooperation Committee.
During the spring session’s commencement, Milli Majlis Speaker Sahiba Gafarova announced that the parliament would take retaliatory actions against what it views as anti-Azerbaijani activities by the European Parliament. Simultaneously, the legislature has initiated the process of withdrawing from the EuroNest Parliamentary Assembly, a regional inter-parliamentary forum involving the European Parliament and several other countries, as reported by Xinhua news agency.
In response to the European Parliament’s alleged biased provisions against Azerbaijan in a recently adopted resolution, the Ambassador of the European Union to Azerbaijan, Marijana Kujundzic, was summoned to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Azerbaijan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs strongly condemned the unfounded and biased claims in the resolution and submitted a protest note to the EU Ambassador during the meeting.
Azerbaijan refuted claims regarding the return of Armenian residents to the Karabakh region as baseless interference in its internal affairs. The country emphasized that Armenian residents voluntarily left the region in line with Azerbaijan’s constitution in 2023 and criticized calls for the release of individuals of Armenian descent labeled as ‘prisoners of war’ as legally unacceptable. The Foreign Ministry highlighted Azerbaijan’s humanitarian actions, including releasing many prisoners and taking steps towards confidence-building, while underscoring that individuals sentenced were involved in serious crimes like terrorism, sabotage, and war crimes.
