Armenia’s Foreign Ministry on Thursday blasted Baku for its authorities’ continued use of anti-Armenian statements, saying that the rhetoric used by the government of Azerbaijan signals that it is not prepared for peace.

“Although the Armenophobic propaganda and threats war by Azerbaijan are meant for domestic consumption, they seriously undermine the peace process and demonstrate that not the population, but the top leadership of Azerbaijan is not prepared for peace,” Armenian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Anna Naghdalyan said in a statement.

”Recently the high ranking leaders along with other state agencies of Azerbaijan have been competing in delivering hysterical Armenophobic statements with no substantive content. It seems that the Azerbaijani leadership is attempting desperately to exceed its previous Armenophobic statements, which is not an easy task to do given its decades-long anti-Armenian consistent discourse,” added Naghdalyan.

“It is worth noting that Azerbaijan’s authoritarian leadership, which promotes hatred among their people and puts forward war threats, used the fight against COVID-19 to commit massive human rights violations in its own country. Recently, a number of reputable international and regional organizations have raised their voice against these practices of Azerbaijan,” explained Naghdalyan.

“The anti-Armenian actions of the leadership of Azerbaijan have already received their legal assessment by the international bodies. In this vein, the ECHR ruling on ‘Makuchyan and Minasyan vs Azerbaijan and Hungary’ case condemned Azerbaijan’s racist policy, which was manifested by the pardon, release and glorification of the murderer Ramil Safarov,” said Naghdalyan who was referencing last week’s conclusion by the European Court of Human Rights, which faulted Azerbaijan for glorifying the ax murder who killed an Armenian soldier in Hungary in 2004.

“The current authorities of Azerbaijan, which consider Armenophobia as the main source of their legitimacy and domestic consolidation, pose a threat not only to Artsakh, Armenia and all Armenians, but also to regional peace and security,” said Naghdalyan. “The security system of Artsakh and Armenia is comprehensive and consolidated enough to effectively address and confront such threats,”, reads the comment.”