Azerbaijan, with the complicity of Turkey, is sending militants from Afghanistan to the occupied part of Nagorno-Karabakh, Artsakh Foreign Minister David Babayan told NEWS.am.
“After the Taliban took power in Afghanistan, some of the Al Qaeda militants were immediately deployed in the Artsakh Republic territories [now] occupied by Azerbaijan. This is done jointly with Turkey, and pursues several goals. Naturally, Turkey wants to save the backbone of its militants whom it uses in various regions, mainly in the Middle East. The deployment of militants in the occupied territories of Nagorno-Karabakh will create serious problems for Russia, Iran, and regional security in general, and is a kind of oversight over Azerbaijan proper. There are already many international terrorist groups—which are not actually overseen by Baku, but overseen by Turkey—in these regions.
Thus, Turkey is strengthening its position in Azerbaijan. Despite the slogans of ‘brotherhood,’ ‘one people, two states,’ Turkey uses levers of force to prevent the ‘brother’ from reconsidering its ‘brotherly relations’ on Ankara’s task.
We see a deeply thought-out geopolitical line where radical terrorist forces are actively used. In order to somehow hide what is happening, information is disseminated about the alleged relocation of Afghan refugees to the occupied part of Nagorno-Karabakh.
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We all know that refugees from Afghanistan prefer Western countries. Since [these] refugees are people who have collaborated with the Western coalition in one way or another, they have views that differ from the Taliban regarding public order and state-building in Afghanistan, and they have nothing to do in Azerbaijan, especially in the occupied territories where Azerbaijan is destroying everything, turning those areas into a bridgehead. Therefore, it is necessary for this information to be re-checked by international organizations, and relevant structures of the interested states, taking into account what stability and security threat this transfer of militants poses,” said David Babayan.
