Response of the Prime Minister of Armenia to the President of Azerbaijan

Upon the request of Armenpress, the Prime Minister of the Republic of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan responded to the statements made by the President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev during his interview with Azerbaijani TV channels on January 7.- Mr. Prime Minister, the President of Azerbaijan made aggressive statements against the Republic of Armenia in an interview with local TV channels. What is your assessment? - Perhaps Baku is trying to “legitimize” the escalation in the region. Aggressive statements are made with the expectation that an aggressive reaction will be heard from Yerevan, which will allow Baku to make its own statements more aggressive, combining this with the dissemination of false information about the violation of the ceasefire by the Armenian army to form a “justification” for a new escalation in the region. We will not go down this path and will adhere to the peaceful strategy and will consistently continue to implement the peace agenda. This means that we will not use the language of aggression but the language of dialog. We will continue to focus on demarcation, on agreeing on the text of the peace treaty, on the implementation of the “Crossroads of Peace” project, on humanitarian issues, including the problems of clarifying the fate of the missing. - The President of Azerbaijan accuses Armenia of being a fascist state. Is this also part of the logic you mentioned?-No doubt, because this is a calculation for a response in the spirit of “you yourself are a fascist”, and the situation I described will start to escalate. But there is another approach: we state that this is how Armenia is perceived in Azerbaijan and try to understand why, what is the reason. On the other hand, it is obvious that a similar perception of Azerbaijan exists in the Republic of Armenia. But the peace strategy is for us to record that we are perceived this way in Azerbaijan and for them to record that they are perceived the same way in Armenia. The peace agenda is aimed at eliminating these perceptions. Part of the agreed articles of the peace treaty closes the page on some of these perceptions, while other parts give us an opportunity to make all mutual negative perceptions part of the bilateral agenda and eliminate them. I would like to add that we have proposed solutions to the two non-agreed articles of the peace treaty and in case of Azerbaijan's positive response we are ready to sign the treaty. What does it mean? -The Republic of Armenia has put the project “Crossroads of Peace” on the table and is preparing to realize it. There is no other project on our agenda.“Crossroads of the World” implies the opening of all transport communications in the region, including Azerbaijan-Azerbaijan through the territory of Armenia and Armenia-Armenia through the territory of Azerbaijan.I have already had the opportunity to state that we have made a very concrete proposal to Azerbaijan to open the Yeraskh-Sadarak-Ordubad-Meghri-Zangelan railroad. It is more than a proposal, it is a concrete solution of concrete issues, and we are waiting for Azerbaijan's positive reaction, after which the agreement will be reached, it will be fixed on paper, and we will start the construction of our sections of the railroad.- What about Aliyev's statement yesterday about the so-called “Western Azerbaijan”? - Nothing new was said on this topic, and I answered to the previous statements in the previous interview with “Armenpress”.- The President of Azerbaijan once again spoke about arming the Republic of Armenia, stating that it will only bring about an increase in the number of military personnel in the Republic of Armenia. There are no elements of illegitimacy in the program of reforming the army of the Republic of Armenia. I must repeat that the Republic of Armenia recognizes the territorial integrity of all its neighbors, including the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan, and expects the same from Azerbaijan, i.e. clear and unconditional recognition of Armenia's territorial integrity.I also stated that we do not set ourselves the task of returning more than 200 square kilometers of the occupied territories of Armenia by military means, because the demarcation process gives us the opportunity to solve this issue peacefully, through negotiations. With all this fixed, no one will be able to challenge the right of the Republic of Armenia to have a defensible army. As for the concerns related to armament, we also have concerns about the armament of Azerbaijan, and we have also heard their concerns. It is for this reason that we have made an offer to Azerbaijan to form a mechanism of mutual arms control and we are waiting for their response.- In recent days Azerbaijan has several times disseminated information that the Armenian army has violated the ceasefire regime on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border. The Armenian Defense Ministry denied this information, recalling the proposal to create a joint mechanism to investigate ceasefire violations. In order to prevent such situations from turning into an occasion for periodic debates, we have proposed to create a joint mechanism to jointly verify all signals of ceasefire violations and come to joint conclusions. We are waiting for Azerbaijan's reaction.- Ilham Aliyev also said that the next meeting of border demarcation commissions will be held in January. I am sure that positive experience of demarcation in 2024 should be developed in a calm, working environment. We are committed to such work.

Reprinted from https://armenpress.am/