Lawmaker Edmon Marukyan from the opposition Bright Armenia Party has reflected on Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s “awkward” answer to a question about Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) during an interview on the popular BBC program HARDtalk on Friday.
"The Armenian forces have never committed a war crime in any operation,” Marukyan stressed.
“The awkward response of the Armenian prime minister to famous presenter Stephen Sackur is incomprehensible, as the latter overtly accused Armenians of committing gross human rights violations and war crimes in Artsakh in 1980s and 1990s, proposing the PM to apologize for them,” he said.
According to the lawmaker, the premier should not only have offered a clear response and publically ruled out such actions by the Armenian forces, but also should have recalled the atrocities committed by the Azerbaijani forces both during the Artsakh Liberation War and the 2016 April War, including beheadings of Armenian soldiers and the murder and mutilation of civilians in their homes, the brutal murder of Armenian officer Gurgen Margaryan in 2004 and the glorification of axe-murderer Ramil Safarov by the Azerbaijani authorities.
“We must constantly speak about all this on all platforms, never miss an opportunity or be embarrassed when we are accused of committing a violation,” the lawmaker stressed.
“Otherwise, when the perpetrator of a war crime is made a victim during a program watched all over the world, it seems that they are trying to clear is from the consequences of responsibility by placing it on those who are fighting for their homeland.
"We must take a clear stance and give clear answers, equating the incumbent authorities of Azerbaijan with those of a state waging wars in the style of a terrorist organization," Marukyan wrote.