Azerbaijanis seek to give an artificial religious coloring to the Karabakh conflict, involving the Muslim countries and this is very dangerous, RA Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian stated at a joint press conference with his Austrian counterpart Michael Spindelegger.

“The international community should more concretely name the addressees of its statements, otherwise, who breaks the ceasefire, makes warlike statements and refuses to withdraw snipers from the line of contact, may consider the international community’s restrained position as an incentive to its actions,” Nalbandian stressed. Meanwhile, it is clear whom the international community addresses.

“The statements are addressed to Azerbaijan and the international community gave a yellow card to Baku. As it is not the Armenian side, that violated the truce, refused to withdraw the snipers from the contact line and made warlike military statements,” the Minister emphasized.

On June 18, an Azerbaijani reconnaissance detachment intruded into Nagorno-Karabakh from Azerbaijan, killing 4 Armenian soldiers and wounding 4 others. The enemy retreated, leaving one soldier killed and ammunition.

EU Special Representative for the South Caucasus Peter Semneby called the June 18 Azerbaijani provocation “a deplorable event”. The Co-Chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group strongly condemned the use of force and called the sides “to refrain from the use of force or the threat of the use of force” not mentioning concrete addressees in their statement.