Details added (first version posted on 14:27)
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 25
Trend:
Attempts of Armenia to escalate tensions on the border with Azerbaijan during the talks between the foreign ministers of Armenia and Azerbaijan in New York are provocative, the head of the press service of the Azerbaijani foreign ministry Hikmat Hajiyev said Sept.25.
He said that the goal of these provocations is to hinder the negotiation process.
Hajiyev went on to add that by seriously violating their obligations under international humanitarian law, the Armenian armed forces continue to target civilians. Resident of Gazakh district of Azerbaijan Elmira Dursunova was wounded September 23 as a result of such a provocation, he said.
Armenia has chosen such inhuman tactics as deliberate placement of firing points on civilian objects, from where the positions of the Azerbaijani armed forces are fired at, as well as the attempt to turn civilians into the object of return fire, according to the spokesperson of the ministry.
This tactics is peculiar to terrorists, when they hide behind civilian objects and persons, and it is a war crime in the first place against the citizens of Armenia.
Hajiyev went on to add that unlike the case with Armenia, the obligations of the Geneva Conventions and additional protocols are an integral part of the mandatory training program of the armed forces of Azerbaijan. In general, protection of civilians, assistance to women, children and the elderly are the high moral values of the Azerbaijani people and the Azerbaijani soldier.
The representative of the foreign ministry said that the bloody ethnic cleansing policy of Armenia against the Azerbaijani people, the Khojaly genocide, firing at Azerbaijani population on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border and even the use of Armenian citizens as a barrier and the object of provocations are a component of criminal inhuman acts of military and political leadership of Armenia.
He went on to add that the cause of ceasefire violations and escalation of tension on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border is a continuation of Armenia's aggression against Azerbaijan.
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 two countries signed a ceasefire agreement in 1994. The co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group, Russia, France and the US are currently holding peace negotiations. Armenia has not yet implemented the UN Security Council's four resolutions on the liberation of the Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding regions.
Edited by CN