Former Russian Co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group Vladimir Kazimirov touched upon the Nagorno Karabakh conflict in the context of recent hostilities in the Karabakh-Azerbaijan contact line. “Armenpress” reports Kazimirov noted at the start of the article that much has been said about the terms and complexities of Nagorno Karabakh conflict. The former Ambassador speaks about the conflict as unusual in terms of its stakeholders, which are three, not two (Armenia, Nagorno Karabakh, Azerbaijan).
Referring to the military onslaught of Azerbaijan against Nagorno Karabalh on April 2, Kazimirov mentions that it was the largest in-scale and most bloodiest military operation since the establishment of the ceasefire regime 22 years ago. In his words, the long-lasting negotiations for the settlement of the conflict did not refrain Baku from using force again.
“There is a necessity to comprehensively examine the controversial actions of Azerbaijani leadership during each regime of that country. The political struggle for the fate of Nagorno Karabakh moved to battlefield, which was the first armed conflict in the Soviet Union. No doubt, Baku was the initiator of use of force. Since then Baku has changed both its military and political-diplomatic policy many times. It is a pity but a fact that it is a long time Baku neglects its commitments assumed by signing official documents. Still 3 months before the establishment of the ceasefire, on February 18, 1994, the Defense Minister of Azerbaijan signed a record together with the Defense Ministers of Armenia and Nagorno Karabakh about meeting in Moscow, where the sides were obliged to withdraw their troops from the contact line after the ceasefire would enter into force. But later Baku refused to withdraw its troops, which resulted in deliberate or un-deliberate incidents in the future. This is one of the main reasons of the tension”, Kazimirov wrote.
He added that the announcements of state officials and the OSCE Minsk Group Co-chairs demonstrate that that the one that has violated the agreements does not bear any responsibility, because the statements of condolences and kind calls are nothing else but an attempt not to offend that country. “Here a question rises. What content should have the calls urging to respect commitments? It should be mentioned that during the rule of Heydar Aliyev the Defense Ministry of Azerbaijan ordered to avoid from ceasefire violations, and even punished those responsible for the violations. The same was done in Nagorno Karabakh and Azerbaijan. Is something similar possible nowadays? Just the contrary, we never hear that someone was punished. It is also well known how Baku glorified murderer Ramil Rafarov. Ilham Aliyev always speaks about the return of “occupied territories”, forgetting that everything happened as a result of wrong calculations of Baku. This is also a cause of the conflict, but it is not the first by significance and from the perspective of the conflict settlement”, the article reads.
Kazimirov states that the root cause of the conflict is over the status of Nagorno Karabakh, and Baku denies solve that issue.
Kazimirov believes it is an urgent problem for now that the international community and the mediators understand the false game played by Baku and call the things by their names. “Enough to make general announcements referring to the parties of the conflict. It is time to make more addressed calls and call things by their names, displaying the negative behavior of the political leadership of Baku”, Kazimirov concluded.
Source: Armenpress
