The website Monumentwatch.org, which monitors Artsakh’s cultural heritage, reports that the Azerbaijani website Culture of Azerbaijan recently published a statement about Artsakh ‘We And  Our Mountains’ monument, saying that it was built in Khankendi in 1967 and is ‘a multicultural site of Azerbaijan and an example of religious tolerance’.

It is well known that the monument is one of the modern symbols of the Armenian Artsakh and was created as a sign and symbol of the Armenian identity of the region. The sculptor of the monument is Sargis Baghdasaryan, and the architect is Yuri Hakobyan.The monument is  made of red tuff specially brought from.

The sculptor described his work as follows: “The monument presents elderly Artsakh spouses in traditional costumes, shoulder to shoulder, with a proud and adamant look and a serious gaze.

The monument does not have a pedestal, but it seems that the mountain hill has been split, and they rose from that split and stood with their feet firmly planted in the soil of the Armenians.

Let us add that the elderly couple, born in Artsakh, were sculpted in the figures of the sculptor’s grandparents. “They are the people, they are the land, they are we, our mountains.

These people were born here, their thousand-year-old roots are here, they are the true owners of this land and nature,” wrote the sculptor (Sargis Baghdasaryan’s “Karabakh People”).

After the complete occupation of Artsakh, the official Azerbaijani side hardly touched this monument for a long time.

The monument, which was the brightest and most famous symbol of Artsakh Armenians, was not touched and ‘unnoticed’ by Azerbaijani journalists and media representatives visiting occupied Stepanakert.

Only some media outlets have suggested that it should be demolished.In 2023, recent publications appeared mentioning that Armenians had ‘‘Armenised’.’ the monument. The Azerbaijani side tried to spread the thesis that they were not against the monument, but against its ‘ideological nationalist interpretation’. It can be inferred from Azerbaijani publications that during the Soviet years, any manifestation directed against the Armenians’ own history, culture and roots in Nagorno-Karabakh was considered “nationalist”.

Recently in Stepanakert, an  azerbaijani Kyamran Razmovar said that the monument was built with funds allocated from the budget of Azerbaijan, therefore it is Azerbaijani.

These approaches show that Azerbaijan is trying to appropriate Armenian cultural heritage by erasing Armenian identity and presenting it as an example of its multiculturalism and tolerance.

We consider it necessary to note that the idea of the monument was carried out  in those years with the direct participation of the Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Regional Council of Nagorno-Karabakh,  Mushegan Ohanjanyan. The leadership of Soviet Azerbaijan was against the construction of the monument and its installation. Moreover, a complaint was filed and demanded that it be dismantled. A special commission from the Central Committee of the Communist Party of azerbaijan arrived in Stepanakert to find out which “we” and which “mountains” are we talking about in the monument “We and  our mountains”.

Due  to the efforts of the Armenian side, it was only possible to save the monument from being dismantled.

 Various persons holding positions in Nagorno-Karabakh in those years, close relatives and relatives of Sargis Baghdasaryan, who was related to the installation of the statue and the author of the statue, show this circumstance in their memories.

This policy contradicts the UN’s Paris Convention in 2005 “On the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions”, which obliges to respect the cultural heritage of all peoples.