CSTO Secretary General does not believe that Azerbaijan will shoot down planes

Yerevan/29.01.13/Turan-ArmInfo: ‘We consider Azerbaijan as a civilized state adhering to standards. Accordingly, I take their decision as a bad joke, or a similar interpretation’. This was said at a briefing on 29 January in Yerevan by the Secretary General of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), Nikolai Bordyuzha, commenting on the decision of the government of Azerbaijan to stop flights of civil aircraft over Karabakh.

"I do not think that a state can afford to destroy civilian aircraft today. Accordingly, I feel strong doubts about the intentions and capabilities of the Azerbaijani leadership to give the order for deliberate destruction of civilian aircraft. We remember the tragedy in the Far East, and the reaction of the global community to this. So I do not take the above information seriously," summed up Bordyuzha.

On January 18 the government of Azerbaijan adopted the Rules for the Airspace of Azerbaijan. The Rules established a frontier air space with the width of 25 km, which has a special mode of use. Violations of the right to use the country's airspace will be considered operating without requesting or warning the air defense forces, failure to obey to flight control or interceptors, as well as flights in prohibited areas or zones of flight restrictions without permission. The adopted document allows shooting down Armenian civilian aircraft over the territory of Karabakh. -02D-