Azerbaijani citizens will be able to travel to Shusha and Aghdam from January 24 on. Chief of the State Automobile Transport Service Anar Rzayev told media that tickets for the bus trips will be sold online on upcoming days.
There will be five routes in total, and those who travel have to buy return tickets in advance. The prices for tickets are as following: Baku-Shusha – 10,4 manats, Baku-Aghdam – 9,4, Ahmadbayli-Shusha-Ahmadbayli – 7, Barda-Aghdam – 5, Fuzuli-Shusha – 6. Ahmadbayli-Shusha routes will be organized four times a week, and others only twice a week.
Due to “a big interest in tours but scarcity of buses”, as an official from Transport Ministry said in the briefing, everyone has a right to travel only once a year.
People from certain categories will have a chance to travel for free. These are Homeland War Heroes and National Heroes (named as such by the President), family members of fallen soldiers, and disabled participants of Karabakh war. They too can travel only once a year.
The buses will be accompanied and guarded by the police.
The news of paid tours to Karabakh was first announced last year in the summer by the State Tourism Agency. It sparked criticism from public figures and IDPs from Shusha and Aghdam back then, and this time it was not different.
Historian Altay Goyushov posted the news on Facebook, mocking the fact that it allows people to travel to those cities only once a year.
Then they say Karabakh is freed, how many times should we say that there is nothing free in dictatorship,
Altay Goyushov
