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YEREVAN, OCTOBER 30, ARMENPRESS. Armenia and Artsakh have never been viewed as countries stockpiling cluster munitions. Chairman of the Standing Committee on State and Legal Affairs of the National Assembly of Armenia Vladimir Vardanyan told ARMENPRESS that he is surprised at the article of the Amnesty International, that says that the Armenian side has used cluster munitions against Azerbaijan's Barda city.
''Neither Armenia nor Artsakh have signed the convention banning the cluster munitions, but the use of this weapon is banned by the international law, because it's a weapon of indiscriminate nature that does not give an opportunity to distinguish between the participants of the military operations and civilians. Use of cluster munitions is banned particularly in densely populated areas, where civilian population is present. Relevant documents that monitored the use of cluster munition in different countries show that Armenia has never been viewed as a country that stockpiled cluster munitions. In our region Turkey is the country that has a leading role in the production of luster munitions, from where Azerbaijan gets its weapons'', Vardanyan said.
The MP noted that the article of Amnesty International is based on some photos from Barda, which give no grounded information.
''Most likely, this is an opportunity for the military-political leadership of Azerbaijan to speculate over this and continue using cluster munitions against the population of Artsakh, for which Azerbaijan has been criticized by the international community many times’', Vladimir Vardanyan said.
He added that he will try to establish contact with the leadership of the organization to understand what are the evidences for such an article.
''I am confident there are no proofs, there are only some photos provided by the Azerbaijani side to the irresponsible employee of Amnesty International. How could these cluster munitions appear in the arsenal of the army of Artsakh, if neither Armenia, nor Artsakh have ever been viewed as countries that stockpile cluster munitions?'', the MP said.
