In an interview with the Russian Trud newspaper published on Friday Lavrov was, in particular, asked to speak about reasons behind the July escalation on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border and evaluate the likelihood of its growing into a large-scale armed conflict.
“A whole complex of reasons had led to the conflict. The basis of it, of course, was the unresolved Nagorno-Karabakh problem plus the overheating of the public space on both sides of the border,” the top Russian diplomat said.
“The geographic factor also served as a kind of trigger: the decision of the Armenian side to reanimate an old border checkpoint located 15 kilometers from the Azerbaijani export pipelines caused heightened anxiety on the one side and an unjustified response from the other, and, as a result, it launched the flywheel of confrontation with the most unpredictable consequences,” he added.
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In his interview Lavrov pointed out that the clashes were the second largest violation of the Moscow-brokered 1994 ceasefire after 2016 clashes near Nagorno-Karabakh and the first such large-scale fighting at the state border of Armenia and Azerbaijan in the past 26 years.
Lavrov said that the Russian co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group, which also includes the United States and France, was in direct contact with the top diplomats of Armenia and Azerbaijan during the whole period of the escalation.
“As a result, it was with active Russian mediation that, although not from the first attempt, but still we got to the agreement on ceasefire from July 16,” he said.
The clashes at the Armenian-Azerbaijani border were followed by tensions between ethnic Armenian and Azerbaijani communities around the world, including in Russia.
Instances of fights and violent rampages involving Armenians and Azerbaijanis were reported in Moscow and other cities of Russia.
Lavrov stressed that “both diasporas should be fully aware of their responsibility both for the observance of the laws of the Russian Federation and for helping to create an atmosphere conducive to the normalization of relations between Baku and Yerevan.”
In his public statements after the clashes Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan called for the establishment of an international mechanism to investigate ceasefire violations in the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict zone. He reiterated that call in his interview on BBC World News’ HARDtalk show on August 14.