Deputy FM: Landmines have killed nearly 3,300 people to date

Nearly 3,300 people have been killed by landmines to date, Azerbaijan’s Deputy Foreign Minister Elnur Mammadov said at the Baku International Conference of Ombudsmen and National Human Rights Institutions on the role of ombudsmen and national human rights institutions in business and human rights, dedicated to the 20th anniversary of the Office of the Ombudsman.

According to him, the return of IDPs is a priority issue for Azerbaijan today:

“In the last two years, more than $3 billion have been allocated from the state budget to restore the liberated territories. The Armenians completely destroyed the infrastructure there. Now those areas need to be restored from scratch. However, the contamination of those territories by Armenians with landmines is the main obstacle to the reconstruction and restoration works. Armenians still refuse to hand over mine maps. The accuracy of the maps is not even 25 percent. To date, about 3,300 people have been victims of landmines.”