Baku, Azerbaijan, July 8
By Elena Kosolapova – Trend:
The international community has never done anything to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, Russian TV presenter Maxim Shevchenko told Trend July 8.
He was commenting on the recent Armenian provocation on the line of contact between Azerbaijani and Armenian troops, as a result of which Azerbaijani civilians were killed.
“I am afraid that, unfortunately, the conflict will, sometime after, be resolved only on the battlefield. And the international community has never undertaken anything and is not going to do anything to resolve it,” Shevchenko said.
He noted that now it is necessary to withdraw troops from the contact line and start direct talks between the presidents of Azerbaijan and Armenia to break the deadlock in the conflict settlement.
Such negotiations are possible to be organized under the mediation of Moscow, according to Shevchenko.
“The Russian president has already repeatedly helped in the organization of such talks, and the Azerbaijani and Armenian presidents have been holding constructive negotiations together in the presence of the Russian head of state,” Shevchenko said.
He expressed hope that constructive talks will be organized after the return of Russia’s President Vladimir Putin from the G20 summit in Hamburg.
It should be noted that on July 4 at about 20:40 (GMT+4 hours), the Armenian armed forces again violated ceasefire and, using 82-mm and 120-mm mortars and grenade launchers, shelled Azerbaijani positions and territories where the civilian population lives, namely the Alkhanli village of the country’s Fuzuli district, thereby grossly violating the requirements of international law, the Azerbaijani defense ministry said earlier.
As a result of this provocation, the residents of the village Sahiba Allahverdiyeva, 50, and Zahra Guliyeva, 2, were killed. Salminaz Guliyeva, 52, who got wounded, was taken to the hospital and was operated on.
The conflict between the two South Caucasus countries began in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. As a result of the ensuing war, in 1992 Armenian armed forces occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts.
The 1994 ceasefire agreement was followed by peace negotiations. Armenia has not yet implemented four UN Security Council resolutions on withdrawal of its armed forces from the Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding districts.