Satellite imagery shows environmental damage of Azerbaijan’s white phosphorus use in Artsakh -DFRLab

Digital Forensic Research Lab has published an article about Azerbaijan’s use of banned white phosphorus munitions in Artsakh (Nagorno Karabakh) during the recent war, stating that satellite imagery from the last week of fighting shows the environmental destruction caused to the forests in Nagorno Karabakh.

In early November, videos reportedly showing banned white phosphorus munitions on Armenian-controlled areas in Karabakh started appearing on Twitter and other social media outlets. The imagery did not attract significant attention from international media or international environmental conservation organizations, but Transparency International Armenia issued an Ecocide Alert for the region, condemning the weapons’ use:

The usage of white phosphorus munitions by Azerbaijani forces in those forests will not only destroy valuable ecosystems & habitats and put threatened species at the risk of extinction but will contaminate rivers & underground waters for years, thus turning into a major threat of regional scale for all the people and wildlife living in the region.

Azerbaijan denied reports that it had used the incendiary munitions in Nagorno Karabakh. But the author of the article states that “there was no open-source evidence that supported them”.

“Satellite imagery confirms, however, that large areas of forest in Armenian-controlled territory showed extensive fire damage at the same time as the videos alleging Azerbaijan’s phosphorous munitions use appeared. The targeting of forested areas is a strategy sometimes used to flush combatants from an area or to inflict high-collateral environmental destruction”, Digital Forensic Research Lab said, adding: “Some videos were filmed by Armenian soldiers as the reported white phosphorus munitions were falling on their defensive positions”.