Thousands of Armenians, traveling from several European countries, gathered in Brussels today to denounce Europe’s “complicity” after Azerbaijan’s military operation in Nagorno-Karabakh, an enclave that has been abandoned by almost all of its Armenian residents.

European leaders are “criminals against the Armenian people, they are shedding the blood of the Armenian people,” said one of the organizers of the demonstration, Talini Tahdian, speaking to the thousands of protesters, many of them young, who arrived in the Belgian capital from France, from other areas of Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany.

About 50 buses carried protesters from Ile-de-France, home to part of France’s Armenian community, one of the largest in Europe.

They gathered in Schuman Square, in the heart of the European institutions. Emotionally charged and angry, many of the protesters denounced the guilt, according to them, of the European Union, which turned a blind eye to the Armenian drama in order to get gas from Azerbaijan in return, which the European bloc buys to compensate partly the loss of Russian natural gas.

“You sold out 2000 years of Armenian civilization for Azeri gas,” read a placard held by one protester.

To denounce the EU’s complicity and collusion with Baku, another poster featured a photo of the European Commission president shaking hands with Azerbaijan’s president, Ilham Aliyev.

Armenian separatists, who have controlled Nagorno-Karabakh for three decades, capitulated and agreed to lay down their arms last week after a lightning offensive by the Azeri army to retake the region.

Within a week the enclave was almost entirely depopulated as more than 100,000 refugees fled to Armenia fearing reprisals from Azerbaijan.

“Give back what belongs to us!” said a young protester, Anita Kervakian, 21, from the Netherlands.

“I have many friends in Karabakh, they all left, everyone,” said an Armenian from France, Karin Narazyan, 40, who traveled from Paris.

The president of the Armenian community of Belgium, Karen Tadevosian, speaking to the crowd of demonstrators, expressed his bitterness at the response given by the European leaders to the demands of the Armenians.

“About 50 organizations sent a letter on July 17” to the head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell.

“We are considering the proposed measures,” was the response they received on August 14, according to Tadevosian. “And when they call for dialogue, it’s just words!”, he said, calling for sanctions against Azerbaijan.

“And if there are no sanctions, then they will really be complicit,” he added, as the crowd applauded him while waving Armenian flags.

At the beginning of the demonstration, about 50 children sang the anthem of the European Union and then the national anthem of Armenia.

According to the organizers, the demonstrators were about 10,000, while according to the Brussels police about 3,000. However, police clarified that this calculation was based on an estimate made at the beginning of the demonstration.

Former French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner was among the protesters to support the Armenian cause.

Europe “must participate in the surveillance, or even the protection of Armenia’s borders. Maintaining or monitoring, protecting the borders of Armenia is very important now,” he stressed to a question from Agence France-Presse.

As for Nagorno-Karabakh, which Armenians call Artsakh, “that unfortunately no longer exists,” added the former head of French diplomacy.