The Azerbaijani regime uses the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict to justify the problems in its own country.

President of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan, who is on a working visit to the US, on Wednesday stated the aforesaid during his lecture delivered at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

In his words, even though 22 years have passed since the armistice signed with Azerbaijan, the residents in Armenia’s state border and various settlements of Nagorno-Karabakh are under daily threat of shootings, to this day.

Reflecting on the use of the word “occupation” in the context of Nagorno-Karabakh, President Sargsyan specifically said: “Karabakh itself was the victim of [Azerbaijani] occupation for 70 years. (…) The real reason for the [current] conflict is that initial occupation, and therefore Nagorno-Karabakh has nothing to do with the concept of the territorial integrity of today’s Azerbaijan.”

In President Sargsyan’s words, the Armenians directly feel the impact of Azerbaijan’s policy of completely emptying Nagorno-Karabakh of its native Armenian population, since the bitter experience of the depopulation of Armenians already exists in another Armenian-populated region, Nakhichevan.