Over the last 20 years, Azerbaijan has invested some $6 billion to help ease the ordeal of refugees in the country, which reflects the commitment of his government to improve their conditions, said Vaqif Sadiqov, Permanent Representative of Azerbaijan to the United Nations in Geneva.

He made the remarks during a meeting with Hanif Hassan Al Qassim, Chairman of the Geneva Centre for Human Rights Advancement and Global Dialogue on the sidelines of an international seminar on the refugee and migrants crisis, which was organized by the Centre, in cooperation with the UAE’s Permanent Mission to the UN in Geneva and the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre, the Gulf News reported.

Sadiqov also presented Azerbaijan’s efforts to create a permanent solution and improve the integration of refugees within the Azerbaijan community, as the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict resulted in the forcible displacement of over 600,000 people from Azerbaijan.

He praised the UAE’s pioneering role in supporting international stability, which has made it among the first countries to provide humanitarian assistance for refugees, through its participation in the international efforts to face humanitarian crises around the world, including the internal refugee crisis in Azerbaijan.

Both sides discussed the latest updates on the migration and displacement situation in Azerbaijan, as well as the lessons learnt that could be used to ease the situation in the Middle East, especially as Azerbaijan hosts the largest refugee community in the world, of up to one million people, which is equivalent to the combined number of refugees in the whole of Europe.

Al Qassim said that the unprecedented increase in the rate of armed conflicts and violence in the Middle East resulted in the decline of the human rights of refugees, while adding that there were an estimated 40 million people who were considered refugees in 2016.

The conflict between the two South Caucasus countries began in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. As a result of the ensuing war, in 1992 Armenian armed forces occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts.

The 1994 ceasefire agreement was followed by peace negotiations. Armenia has not yet implemented four UN Security Council resolutions on withdrawal of its armed forces from the Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding districts.