It is difficult to characterize Bayram Safarov’s statement in any other way than a New Year joke.

Davit Babayan, Spokesperson of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic President, stated the aforementioned.

He noted this commenting, at Armenian News-NEWS.am’s request, on the statement by Bayram Safarov, who claims to be chairman of the so called “Azerbaijani Community of Nagorno-Karabakh” social association, that, “the Armenians of Karabakh consider themselves citizens of Azerbaijan  in their soul, but they are afraid to say this openly.”

“That’s Bayram Safarov’s New Year joke,” Babayan noted and added: “We [i.e. the Karabakh Armenians] very much ‘love’ and ‘can’t wait’ to become the citizens of Azerbaijan so we may relive [the Armenian pogroms in the early 1990s in the Azerbaijani cities of] Sumgait, Baku, Kirovabad [i.e. today’s Ganja] again.”