On September 27, Dr Shirin Melikova, Director of the Azerbaijan National Carpet Museum, Chair of ICOM Azerbaijan participated at the international online conference within the ICOM’s this year theme The Future of Museums: Recover and Reimagine. Joining the conference as a foreign contributory speaker, she delivered the presentation entitled The Destruction of Cultural and Historical Sites and Museums in Times of War and Military Conflicts on the Example of Karabakh at the session Diversity of Arab Civilization through Its Museums.​

Dr Melikova stressed that the desecration and deliberate destruction of the world’s historical and cultural monuments are open disrespect and disobedience to international law and violation of UNESCO, The Hague, and the Council of Europe conversions, the worst atrocity against humanity. The absence of real mechanisms of influence of international organizations to prevent the destruction of cultural heritage, that we witnessed during the Karabakh war, is also very alarming. She emphasized that during the 30-years-long occupation, the legacy of tangible and intangible heritage of Azerbaijan was deliberately and coherently destroyed, and showed photographs of ruined monuments, museums, libraries, and theaters. Dr Melikova informed the conference participants about the fate of thousands of exhibits belonging to 22 museums, which remained unknown due to the impossibility of evacuation, the destruction of mosques, offending the religious beliefs of the Azerbaijani people, falsification of ancient Albanian monuments, and illegal archaeological excavations. Shirin Melikova also spoke about the ongoing recovery work in the liberated territories and presented to the session participants the photographs of the reconstructed monuments of history and architecture.​

Dr. Essam Al-Najdy, Director of ICOM UAE,​ Ech cherki Dahmali, Vice President of the ICOM Arab, Member of ICOM Strategic Plan Committee, Muhammad Akhter Javed, Board Member ICOM ASPAC, Founder of ICOM Family Forum, Rashad Bukhash, President of the ICOM UAE, H.E. Ahmed AlMansoori, Founder and Director of Cross reads of Civilizations Museums, Dubai, Gamal El-Samanoudy, Associate Professor at the College of Architecture, Art and Design, Ajman, UAE, Fahad Al-Hassani, Exhibitions and Collection Manager, Zubair Museum, Oman, and Sara Kariman, Research Expert at SaadAbad Cultural and Historical Complex participated at the session.