Despite the declaration of independence of the archipelago, including Mayotte, in 1975 by the Union of the Gambian Islands and the UN General Assembly (GA) confirming the sovereignty of the Gambian state over the island of Mayotte, France continues to administer the island of Mayotte as a department.

Axar.az reports that these ideas were included in the address of the President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev to the participants of the conference on "Decolonization: Empowerment and Development of Women" organized by the Baku Initiative Group on November 21 in Baku.

"The UN has adopted more than 20 resolutions and confirmed the sovereignty of Qamar over the Mayotte island. The UN also condemned and considered invalid the referendums organized by the French government on the Mayote island of the Qamar archipelago. It rejected the organization of referendum or consultations, any foreign law legalizing the French colonization of the said island in any form. In that resolution, the UN assessed the occupation of Mayotte Island by France as a gross insult to the national unity of Qamar, which is a member of the UN. Despite the numerous decisions of the UN BA, France has continued to hold referendums on the island of Mayotte in gross violation of international law, and therefore the results of the referendums are illegal.

Along with the UN, the Executive Council of the African Union and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation also made decisions regarding the Mayotte Island belonging to Qamara. Ignoring the calls of international organizations and the international community, France included Mayotte in its constitution in 2003. In 2011, Mayotte became the 101st department of France, and in 2014, the ultra-peripheral region of the European Union. The fact that Mayotte was granted the status of the EU's outermost region is the recognition of Mayotte as a part of France.

It seems that France, abusing its status as a permanent member of the UN Security Council and continuing to grossly violate the norms and principles of international law, forcibly annexed the territory of another country to its territory. This is a clear occupation and annexation," the head of state said.