At the orders of Azeri President Ilham Aliyev, the 3rd army corps is being replaced by the state border patrol service along the Ghazakh and Astafa sections (along the Tavush region) of the Armenian-Azeri border. According to expert on Azerbaijan Ashot Movsisyan, the Azeri Armed Forces are being replaced by the border patrol in these sections. Meanwhile, Azerbaijan, through this action, is not promoting peace, but propaganda. “Azerbaijan will prove whether it wants peace, but through making such movements, we witness the fact that it is preparing for war more so than it is preparing to create peace,” the expert told reporters.
Ashot Movsisyan is convinced that, through allowing occasional calmness at the border, Azerbaijan is giving the Armenian authorities time to carry out their expectations. “They expect for the Armenian Armed Forces to be removed from the five regions, which are an inseparable part of Artsakh. They expect the return of territories, after which they will attempt to solve the issue of controlling all of Artsakh. Azerbaijan understood that trying to pressure Armenia with its force is not effective, and so it is lying to Armenians and to the international community through saying it wants peace. Meanwhile, the Azerbaijani authorities’ position on Artsakh has not changed.”
Ashot Movsisyan also mentioned that Ilham Aliyev wrote about how next year must be a turning point in the resolution process. “However, these actions taken by Azerbaijan are more so propaganda than attempts to solve the Artsakh conflict.”
Luiza Sukiasyan
