“The leadership of Azerbaijan violates the peaceful efforts of the international community and throws down the gauntlet to the Minsk Group Co-Chair countries,” Armenian Deputy Foreign Minister Shavarsh Kocharyan said, commenting on the statement of the President of Azerbaijan that “the April military actions and the ongoing tensions along the Line of Contact are the internal matter of Azerbaijan.”
“First of all, Azerbaijan has signed the 1994 Trilateral Armistice Agreement and the 1995 Agreement on the Consolidation of the Ceasefire Regime, which have no time limitations, with Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh. The international community and the Minsk Group Co-Chair countries, which have the mandate for mediation mission, have called on numerous occasions to strictly adhere to those agreements, maintain ceasefire regime and resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh issue exclusively through peaceful negotiations,” Shavarsh Kocharyan said in comments to Armenpress.
“It is obvious that resumption by Azerbaijan of military actions against Nagorno-Karabakh in April of 2016 is a gross violation of Azerbaijan’s international commitments entered into under the abovementioned agreements, constitutes an explicit disregard for the calls of the Minsk Group Co-Chair countries and is an aggression against the self-determined Nagorno-Karabakh Republic,” Shavarsh Kocharyan said.
“In its recent statement the leadership of Azerbaijan violates the peaceful efforts of the international community and throws down the gauntlet to the Minsk Group Co-Chair countries,” he noted.
“Either Azerbaijan believing that Nagorno-Karabakh settlement is its internal issue pretends that it takes part in the ongoing negotiations within the framework of the Minsk Group Co-Chairmanship, or it participates in the negotiations at the same time pretending that the conflict is its internal issue. Both cases are aimed at undermining the mediatory efforts of the international community,” the Deputy Foreign Minister said.
“If the leadership of Azerbaijan makes such statements without realizing the abovementioned, it still bears the responsibility for the war crimes committed by the Azerbaijani side during the April aggression,” Shavarsh Kocharyan concluded.