In an interview with “Reuters”, President Serzh Sargsyan spoke about the readiness for the concession of territories from the Armenian side. In an interview with Kiselyov, Aliyev spoke about their maximum concession – to give a status of an autonomous republic to Karabakh but in the territory of Azerbaijan. In the conversation with Aravot.am, to the questions of whether we do not have a defeatist position now on this issue, former Defense Minister Vagharshak Harutyunyan replied, “No, it is a diplomatic approach. This question always existed: territories in exchange for the status. What is changed now? Nothing is changed. But what do we get as a result, everyone understands that the Armenian side has a constructive position while Azerbaijan has not. I do not see any defeating thing in this matter.”
Political analysts are concerned that we do not have the consciousness that ceding territories means ceding Yerevan. Vagharshak Harutyunyan said, “Yes, I also share this view that no territory should be ceded unless the status of Karabakh is resolved because it changes the military-political balance. If Azerbaijan does not agree now, later, when you are weak, why it should agree. But there is a diplomatic approach where you yourself choose your tactics. Now, Azerbaijan will not reach anything, therefore it becomes indignant and takes extreme measures. What did Azerbaijan get after the April incidents?”
To our observation that we are the one who lost, we lost territories, Vagharshak Harutyunyan responded, “There is no war without losses, we are at a war. But what did Azerbaijan get? It proved one thing that those huge resources that were allocated for the army – about 25 billion dollars – are lost, Azerbaijan’s army is not a combating army, and the huge investments had gone to rack and ruin. A natural indignation has emerged with its citizens. Now, they are thinking that they were poorly taken care of, while the poverty rate in Azerbaijan is very high irrespective of the fact that they have oil and a huge budget that allegedly to return Karabakh. But where is it? The same questions are raised inside the army. Most importantly that the people outside are looking whether Azerbaijan is able to solve the problem by military means or not. Their approach is shaped accordingly.”
To our concern whether we did not lose a much more important thing in the April war in addition to the territories – the stance of a winner, Vagharshak Harutyunyan replied, “We had lost territories during the first war too, didn’t we? A part of Martakert and Martuni which is now under their control but we are not saying that we defeated. The victory is estimated by strategic results. We lost there but in a global sense and military sense, we destroyed their confidence in their forces and army. The inefficiency of their military-political system which does not provide the solution of the problems set before them. In a political sense, we won, the whole world understood that despite the fact that Azerbaijan has money, it cannot solve the problem. The politics is built on it.”
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