Truce in Karabakh is temporary, humanitarian – Baku

Baku / 10.10.20 / Turan: A ceasefire in the zone of the Karabakh conflict is temporary and has a humanitarian basis. The negotiation process should have a period and if there is no progress in the withdrawal of the occupying troops from the Azerbaijani territories, military operations will be resumed. The goal of Azerbaijan is not a truce, but the restoration of its territorial integrity. This was the leitmotif of today's press conference of Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov and Azerbaijani Presidential Assistant Hikmet Hajiyev, dedicated to the results of the Moscow meeting of the ministers of Azerbaijan and Armenia.

Despite reaching an agreement on a ceasefire on Saturday at 12:00, Armenia violated the agreements from the very first minutes, Presidential Aide Hikmet Hajiyev said at a press conference.

He stressed that the ceasefire was concluded on a humanitarian basis and is temporary.

At the same time, Hajiyev noted that the first stage of military operations to enforce peace ended successfully and Azerbaijan, as a responsible member of the international community, taking into account numerous appeals, accepted the offer to participate in the negotiations in Moscow.

He said that the ultimate goal of the negotiations is not an armistice, but ensuring the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Azerbaijan. “We must continue the successes of our soldiers on the diplomatic front. As a continuation of our military victories, our superiority continues on the diplomatic front,” Hajiyev said.

He stressed that a new situation is being created in the negotiation process - after the successful actions of the Azerbaijani army, the liberation of a significant part of the occupied territories, the status quo has already changed, there is no line of contact between the troops, which the Armenian side represented as a "border".

“After that, the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs must ensure the continuation of negotiations aimed at results. That is, a plan for the withdrawal of Armenian troops from the occupied territories should be prepared. Today's political dynamics must be geared towards this result. Peace in the South Caucasus cannot be ensured until the Armenian troops are withdrawn from the occupied territories. The co-chairing countries should mobilize their efforts even more, the Armenian troops should be withdrawn from the occupied territories,” Hajiyev said.

Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov drew attention to the points of the Moscow statement, which speak of the continuation of negotiations on the previously adopted basic principles of settlement and the preservation of the invariability of the format of negotiations.

The invariability of the format means that negotiations should continue between Azerbaijan and Armenia, without the involvement of a third party, that is, the occupation regime,  on which Yerevan has recently insisted.

Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov, answering a question about the timing of the exchange of prisoners and bodies of the dead, said that this operation would be prepared and coordinated by the Red Cross.

“The conditions have not yet been created to start these operations. For Armenia has once again resorted to provocation. An armistice was supposed to come by 12 o'clock today, but Armenia made an attempt to carry out an offensive, but was thrown back,” Bayramov said.

As for the role of Turkey in the settlement of the conflict, as noted by presidential aide Hajiyev, Ankara is already at the negotiating table as a member of the OSCE Minsk Group.

“The processes taking place in the South Caucasus worry fraternal Turkey as well, it continues to exert its efforts. Close participation of brotherly Turkey as a regional state is expected, both in the Minsk Group and in other formats,” Hajiyev said.-0-