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On January 26, the Member of the RA NA Delegation to PACE Hayk Mamijanyan gave speech at PACE Winter Session.

“Dear colleagues,

I can see the looks on your faces: Armenians are going to speak about Azerbaijani aggression, POWs, Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and Azerbaijani delegation will burden you with a flow of fake information. But let me explain to you why we are obliged to speak up about the humanitarian catastrophe caused by the Azerbaijani blockade of the Lachin corridor and other above-mentioned topics. Please consider my words not as a political speech but as a food for thinking.

For instance, some of us today after the session will visit one of the restaurants here in Strasbourg and I am asking you while choosing your dinner please keep in mind that 120.000 people in Nagorno Karabakh have nothing to choose from but the plain pasta or buckwheat: no vegetables, no fruits, nothing.

And when you, honourable colleagues, will get to your cosy and warm hotel rooms to hide from the cold wind and watch some news, please remember that 120.000 Armenians have no gas and electricity for 6-8 hours a day.

For those of you who have children, please imagine what would you do if someone in the world would hinder their education. If it would be so cold in the classrooms that the schools had to shut down for almost a month.

And if any of you will have a headache after a long day, please while swallowing a painkiller remember that 120.000 Armenians in Artsakh are running out of meds.

And when Mr. Seidov will tell that self-proclaimed activists are exercising their magnificent right of freedom of speech, though the sentence “freedom of speech in Azerbaijan” is an oxymoron, please remember that Azerbaijan is 104^th in the Environmental Performance Index by Yale University and I don't recall any mass ecological protests in Azerbaijan ever.

Though a few moments ago we witnessed an Azerbaijani representative questioning French democracy.

Could you imagine that after the 9^th of November of 1989, after the Fall of the Berlin Wall in Europe there will be a place where families and relatives are forcefully divided. In the 21^st century children are not able to meet their parents for more than one and a half months. But make no mistakes: we can't wait for almost 30 years - the Lachin corridor has to be unblocked now. And as Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention stated a few weeks ago: “The world must act immediately to prevent a second Armenian Genocide”.

Thank you and I call you to support the amendments presented by the Armenian delegation.” Hayk Mamijanyan said.