Azerbaijan, accused of destroying Artsakh's cultural heritage, elected to UNESCO World Heritage Committee

At the 25th session of the General Assembly of States Parties to the 1972 UNESCO World Heritage Convention held in Paris on Monday, Azerbaijan was elected as a member of the UNESCO World Heritage Committee for the 2025–2029 term.

According to the Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry, five countries competed for a single seat allocated to the Eastern European region. In the first round of voting, Azerbaijan secured the support of 92 out of 160 countries.

The decision comes amid Azerbaijan’s systematic destruction of Armenian cultural and religious heritage in Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh) following the 2020 war and the 2023 mass exodus of its Armenian population.