Captivity life in a native land...

/By Azernews/

By Gulgiz Dadashova

They are the tombs of the beloved.

Each holds the body of a mother, father, sister or son, who were once very happy in these lands.

Now, they are victims of the horrendous aggression that is shaming the human.

This is their final resting place, hundreds of miles from their beloved ones and under the feet of the Armenian invasion troops.

Their loved ones are still waiting for a day when these lands will be liberated and they will visit their loved ones buried in this graveyard.

“No one will ever know how much it hurts when you cannot visit the tomb of your father. When you even don’t know whether his tomb is still in place,” used to say my fellow Vusala Mammadova, who was forced to leave her home in Shusha after the Armenian invasion back in 1992.

Dilgam Asgarov and Shahbaz Guliyev, along with their friend Hasan Hasanov, once locals of the Shaplar village of Kalbajar, a region in Nagorno-Karabakh that is occupied by Armenia, could not resist the will to visit the graves of their beloved.

They knew each and every corner of these lands. “The Shaplar village is Mekkah for me,” used to say Dilgam Asgarov.

But the fate was cruel to them.

Hasan Hasanov was killed by Armenian troops, while Dilqem Esgerov and Sahbaz Guliyev were taken hostage by Armenian officials on their way to the graveyard.

 Armenia accused them of “violating territorial rights”.

Guliyev and Asgarov have been judged illegally by the unrecognized courts of a separatist regime in occupied Nagorno-Karabakh. Following an expedited “judicial process" in December 2015, Asgarov was sentenced to life imprisonment and Guliyev to 22 years.

A video confirming that Asgarov was tortured has been circulating throughout social media, showing Asgarov walking with a limp.

“Do not worry, I am normal. Here in prison they give us water and bread. Say hello to everybody,” Dilgam Asgarov writes in his letter from the Armenian prison to his family.

Representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) usually visit the Azerbaijani captives and help them to be in touch with their families.

“I miss my Nazli,” he writes to his son-in-low asking to kiss his grandchild, adding “I am alive yet.”

His wife Firuze struggles to stand strong every time after she receives a letter from her husband. “Visiting your home is a crime?” she asks while holding in hands Dilgam’s photo and fondles it.

“He went to visit the village where he was born, to see the grave of his mother. Now Armenians say he “violated” the border. Armenians occupied my home, my lands, turned over one million people into refugees and IDPs in their native lands. They don’t regard their actions as crime, but say that Dilgam committed a crime by visiting his motherland,” she said in her interview to local media.

“Armenians have crashed each and everything on their ways. I have seen our home in the videos taken there…Armenians also destroyed the graveyards, shelled tombs. Some of the tombs were even opened. How cruel these people could be. What they wanted from the dead bodies,” she began to cry as remembered the fate of her husband.

Senem Guliyeva, a 80-year-old mother of Shahbaz Guliyev, is still unaware of her son’s fate.

The old woman lives in the Tartar region located near the frontline.  She lives their alone, refusing to live her home despite efforts of her grandchildren and relatives.

Her home was damaged during the shelling of Azerbaijani settlements by Armenian militaries during the April escalation. When she was frustrated why her son did not come to visit her, his family was forced to lie that he was imprisoned in Russia.

“Each time when we visit her she asks about her son. She says that sees him in her dreams, and wants to visit him,” said a relative of Shahbaz Guliyev.

Azerbaijan, whose over 4,000 citizens were taken captive, hostage, or went missing as a result of the Nagorno-Karabakh war, has repeatedly declared its readiness to begin negotiations with Armenia in this direction.

The State Committee on Affairs of Refugees and IDPs,  the State Commission on Prisoners of War, Hostages and Missing Persons and other agencies have repeatedly urged international organizations, including the ICRC, to assist in release of Guliyev and Asgarov.