Since the beginning of September, the Armenian media and social networks have again taken up the topic of Azerbaijan’s losses in the Second Karabakh War, referring to the well-known order of the Azerbaijani president on providing housing for the families of martyrs and disabled people.

On January 25, 2021, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev signed a decree on a number of measures to improve the social and living conditions of the families of martyrs and persons who became disabled in connection with the protection of the territorial integrity, independence and constitutional order of the Republic of Azerbaijan.

The document envisages provision in 2021-2025 with apartments or individual houses for:

1.1. Persons registered from January 1, 2014 to January 1, 2020 at local executive authorities as those in need of housing and recognized as disabled in connection with the protection of the territorial integrity, independence and constitutional order of the Republic of Azerbaijan, and families of martyrs, as well as persons recognized as disabled in connection with the liquidation of the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant (including the performance of military duties), regardless of the date of registration.

1.2. persons registered at local executive authorities as those in need of housing and recognized as disabled in connection with the protection of the territorial integrity, independence and constitutional order of the Republic of Azerbaijan during military operations carried out in 2020, and families of martyrs.

By the order of the head of state dated January 25, 2021, there are plans to provide families of martyrs and war invalids in 2021-2025 with up to 11,000 apartments and individual houses.

According to Armenian channels and websites, the order of the Azerbaijani president dated January 25 reveals the ‘real’ number of casualties in the 44-day war. In particular, the Armenian Telegram channel Baghramyan 26 writes about this.

The same conclusions can be seen on the website and Twitter of FMGnews.

Armenian sources, making calculations, claim that the real number of losses in Azerbaijan was twice as high as the officially declared figures: “...let’s remember that declaring its losses, the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry announced 2,783 dead, 100 missing persons and 1,245 war invalids. By adding these numbers, as a result we get 4,128 dead, missing and disabled war veterans. When subtracting this figure from 11,000 we get 6,872. That’s the number of undeclared losses among the citizens of the Republic of Azerbaijan, excluding the terrorists and military personnel of the Turkish Armed Forces that were brought in.”

Meanwhile, the text of the order, given by us above, describes everything clearly.

These aren’t the first attempts of making falsified calculations by the Armenian side without taking into account the real state of affairs. Earlier, there were even such figures for allegedly Azerbaijani losses: “10,000 killed and 15,000-20,000 wounded, a total of 25,000-30,000 people."

Earlier, similar discussions in Armenian social networks were caused by the news article “Over the past months, more than 6,400 families of martyrs and veterans have been involved in active employment programs.”

The incorrect headline allowed the Armenian side to talk about the ‘unreliability’ of the official data, while the news was about the number of people, not families: “Over the past months, more than 6,400 people from these categories have been involved in active employment programs. About 5,000 of them have created small business sites as part of the self-employment program.”

Faktyoxla Lab. has tried to understand the ‘Armenian arithmetic’ and explain where it is wrong.

Let’s start with the fact that in December 2020, the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry published official data on the losses of the republic in the Second Karabakh War. Azerbaijan’s losses in the course of hostilities in the zone of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict since September 27 amounted to 2,783 dead, while more than 100 servicemen are considered missing and 1,245 were injured.

As the search for the missing continued and the wounded died, the numbers changed. In May 2021, the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry published a list of soldiers who died during the escalation in Nagorno-Karabakh, which contained already 2,895 people, 19 were considered missing.

According to the latest data, 2,906 servicemen became martyrs, 8 are listed as missing.

These data cannot be questioned and interpreted in a different way, because, as follows from the Azerbaijani presidential order, the families of martyrs and persons who became disabled in connection with the protection of the territorial integrity, independence and constitutional order of the Republic of Azerbaijan will be provided with apartments and individual houses.

That is, these measures aren’t intended only for families of martyrs and disabled of the second Karabakh - Patriotic War of 2020, but also relate to veterans, disabled and martyrs of both Karabakh wars, aimed at protecting the territorial integrity, independence and constitutional order of Azerbaijan. In total, these are tens of thousands of people.

How many martyrs did Azerbaijan have in two wars?

In 2014, Azerbaijan for the first time made public the number of servicemen killed in the first Karabakh war - 11,557 people.

The lists of martyrs were published on the website of the state service for mobilization and conscription. The list contains the first official data on the deaths in 1991-1994. The lists contain only the names of servicemen, and some of them are still missing. There are no civilians in it.

The list wasn’t complete, as it didn’t include civilians killed by the Armenians. On October 27, 1993, the then president of the country, Heydar Aliyev, at a meeting in Baku with the president of Iran, said that Azerbaijan had lost 11,000 persons and 25,000 servicemen were wounded in the Karabakh war. A week later, speaking on local TV, the head of the republic reported on 16,000 killed servicemen and 22,000 wounded. The same figures were given by Azerbaijani Ambassador to the US Hafiz Pashayev. During official meetings in May-June 1994, the president said that the number of Azerbaijanis killed in the war was close to 21,000.

Thus, the number of martyrs of the Karabakh war in Azerbaijan isn’t nearly 3,000 (equals to servicemen killed in the Second Karabakh War), but over 11,000 people more, if we take as a basis the incomplete list from the website of the civil service. All these persons have the status of martyrs, assigned to them in accordance with the rules ‘On perpetuating of the name of the martyr and about privileges to families of martyrs’ approved by the Cabinet of Ministers in 1994.

But that’s not all. After the 44-day war, the Azerbaijani Cabinet of Ministers approved amendments to the rules ‘On perpetuating of the name of the martyr and about privileges to families of martyrs.’ According to the document, civilians in Azerbaijan who died as a result of Armenian provocations (attacks, strikes) outside the combat zone are also given the status of martyrs.

According to the document, the following persons are considered martyrs:

servicemen (and employees of other special services) who were killed or went missing during military operations in order to protect the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan, as well as during performing combat missions or official duties in connection with combat support;

civilians - those killed or gone missing as a result of the military provocations of Armenia.

The martyr status was assigned to two servicemen who have been killed recently in a road accident in Lachin district – re-enlisted conscripts of the Azerbaijani army: junior sergeant Joshgun Zeynalli and soldier Orkhan Rahimli.

The journalists killed in Kalbajar district in an explosion of a mine planted by Armenians are listed as martyrs - an employee of the AzerTag agency Maharram Ibrahimov and an operator of AzTV Siraj Abishov. The corresponding status was given to their families. The families of martyrs have already received documents for apartments provided to them by the state.

The martyr status was also granted to the pilot of the MiG-29 aircraft of the Azerbaijan Air Force, Lieutenant Colonel Rashad Atakishiyev, who died on July 24, 2019 in the crash of the MiG-29 aircraft of the Azerbaijan Air Force, which was performing a night training flight.

The above-mentioned facts indicate that there are much more martyrs, and therefore, families, falling under the program of providing apartments in Azerbaijan - more than 11,000 people.

The number of people with disabilities should also be added to this indicator. Thus, in the first Karabakh war, 50,000 Azerbaijanis became disabled.

Thus, the presidential decree dated January 25, 2021 covers the disabled and martyrs of the two Karabakh wars, as well as the disabled of Chernobyl. This document in no way indicates that 11,000 apartments will be provided exclusively only to those killed and wounded during the Second Karabakh War.

Therefore, the claims of Armenian sources are biased in nature and are nothing more than falsification of facts.