Whether the Change in the Status of the Nagorno-Karabakh Armed Conflict from Non-international to International Meant for the Status of Protected Persons Affected by That Change?

Abstract

This thesis attempts to explore which legal regime and which rules of protection of International Humanitarian Law are applicable in the situation of conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh region, between former Soviet Republics of Armenia and Azerbaijan. The thesis seeks to discern how the changed nature of the conflict, which started as non-international, within Soviet Union, and continued as international armed conflict between newly emerged independent states after dissolution of the Union, affected application of the legal regime and pertaining to that regime rules of protection of protected persons. Therefore, reference was given to the established norms and principles of IHL, tenets of the different in nature armed conflicts and concurrent analysis was done in relation to the conflict at discussion. In this way, this research attempted to access how the changed nature of the conflict affected protection of protected persons (civilians) in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and which rules of protection were applicable in the given circumstances.