The European Union should make a targeted assessment of Azerbaijan and Turkey, member of the Armenian National Assembly Anna Grigoryan said, addressing the EuroNewst Parliamentary Assembly.

“Security challenges in our region continue to remain acute while Azerbaijan thinks that conflicts can be solved by war. Nearly two years ago Azerbaijan decided they could put an end to the Nagorno Karabakh conflict by using force, which in itself is a direct violation of the fundamental principle enshrined in the UN Charter and the Helsinki Final Act,” she said.

“The war proved to be disastrous, but didn’t solve the conflict. The conflict is still there. The outbreak of hostility and anti-Armenianism clouded the perspectives of peace agreement in the region even after the November 9th trilateral statement,” she added.

The MP noted that it’s hard to speak about political dialogue with Azerbaijan, when until today Armenian prisoners of war and civilians are held in Azerbaijan and exposed to inhumane treatment daily.

“How can we talk about security, when on daily basis threats of use of force, cynicism, belligerent rhetoric, propaganda and xenophobia continue to be heard from Azerbaijan? Even more, while we are holding our session, Azerbaijani military continues the occupation of the sovereign Armenian territories in Syunik. Given the aggressive policy led by Azerbaijan it becomes difficult to think about security environment in our region, but the deep silence and indifference of Europe makes it even more challenging,” Anna Grigoryan stated.

“Here we have to be unflinchingly honest, when we are talking about our shared values or our red lines concerning security issues,” she emphasized.

“If the war unleashed against Nagorno Karabakh unleashed by Azerbaijan and fully supported by Turkey was not the red line to put sanctions against war criminal Ilham Aliyev and his regime, if detaining and torturing of our prisoners of war is not the red line, I have to ask you: do we stand for a political dialogue or aggression? Do we support political dialogue or policy of cohesion? If we do chose political dialogue and security, and not terrorism, aggression or xenophobia, then the EU has to make an unequivocal targeted political assessments of Azerbaijan and Turkey. Double standards, selective approaches and hypocrisy should be rejected if we honestly want to reach security in our region,” she stated.