Azerbaijan is forming consensus against Armenia to announce that there was no other option in case of attack – Sergei Melkonian

Baku is trying to include anti-Armenian issues into the Russian-Azerbaijani agenda, Research Fellow at APRI Armenia Sergei Melkonian told Alpha News.

“Most of Aliyev’s interview was devoted to Armenia. Baku is trying to include anti-Armenian issues into the Russian-Azerbaijani agenda. One of these issues is that the EU monitoring mission should not be on the border with Armenia, since this point also includes Russian border troops that are on the Azerbaijan-Armenia and Armenia-Artsakh borders. Considering that Armenia has decided not to deploy Russian troops there, therefore, EU observers remain,” Melkonian said.

He noted that Aliyev is trying in every way to show that he shares Russia’s agenda, but this is not the case.

“The idea of Aliyev’s interview was to show that Azerbaijan almost completely shares Russia’s agenda—which is not the case—and to show that Armenia is against the Russian agenda. This will allow Azerbaijan and Aliyev to get a neutral position from Russia if Azerbaijan decides to attack Armenia.

We see that Azerbaijan’s policy over the past four years is as follows: when Armenia fulfills Aliyev’s demand, he puts forward new preconditions. For example, this could be the so-called ‘Zangezur corridor.’ Azerbaijan has also repeatedly emphasized that until Armenia changes the Constitution, there will be no peace agreement. Azerbaijan is gradually putting the issue of the rights of the so-called ‘Western Azerbaijan’ community on the agenda and notes that this ‘community’ has already asked Armenia to provide security and other guarantees to 300,000 Azerbaijanis so that they can come and live in Armenia,” Sergei Melkonian added.

He also stressed that Azerbaijan’s goal is for Armenia to condemn the military and political leaders of Artsakh for participating in the Artsakh wars.

“In recent years, Azerbaijan has been constantly claiming that Yerevan is allegedly a historical Azerbaijani city. If you look at the map of the so-called ‘Western Azerbaijan’ community, you will see that it is a map of Armenia. Therefore, this agenda is directly aimed against Armenia’s statehood and sovereignty. Baku also wants Armenia to be ready to cooperate with Azerbaijan to condemn the military-political leadership of Artsakh. Azerbaijan said it has already officially appealed to the Armenian authorities with a request to complete this process. Baku’s discourse is as follows: if Armenia wants to achieve peace, it must condemn what happened during the Artsakh wars and judge the people who made decisions during that period,” Sergei Melkonian concluded.