YEREVAN. – Baku rejects the right of people’s self-determination and non-application of force, or two out of the three basic principles, which the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs offer, Armenian deputy FM Shavarsh Kocharyan said commenting the Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev’s New Year speech, Armenian MFA informs.

“The Azeri president’s regular New Year speech is another proof that Baku rejects the two – including the right of people’s self-determination and non-application of force – out of the three basic principles, which the Co-Chairs offer for settling the Artsakh [Nagorno-Karabakh] peace process and focuses only on one principle that is the territorial integrity, by contradicting to the UN Charter and misinterpreting it. This is the very attitude of Azerbaijan to fail the negotiation process and maintain the status-quo,” he said.

At the same time, Baku has the chance to satisfy its desire and to reject the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs’ format and achieve the shift in the status-quo. However, first of all Baku should recognize the independence of Artsakh and withdraw its troops from the occupied territories of Artsakh.