YEREVAN. – The April events have confirmed the inability of the Azerbaijani party to serve as a negotiating partner, writes the political analyst Masis Masis Mailian (who is currently appointed as Karanakh ambassador) in his article published in Analyticon.

As the analyst stressed, by starting a new armed aggression Azerbaijan not only broke the negotiation process and violated its international obligations but also tried to denounce the tripartite Ceasefire Agreement and the Agreement on strengthening the cease-fire signed by defense heads of NKR, Azerbaijan, and Armenia in 1994-1995. The notes about the denunciation of earlier adopted documents have been spread by the Permanent Mission of Azerbaijan to the OSCE, April 11, 2016 and the Permanent Mission of Azerbaijan to the UN, 14 April 2016. Thus, the authorities in Baku tried to refuse the documents, which were signed by the official representatives of the NKR leadership on equal bases with Azerbaijan.

“The OSCE co-chairing countries promptly and firmly reacted to the actions of the Azerbaijani authorities. The mediating countries noted, that 1994 Ceasefire Agreement and the following agreement adopted to strengthen the ceasefire regime in Nagorno-Karabakh adopted in 1995 still constitute the reconciliation basis in the conflict zone. The UN Secretary-General urged all the parties involved to fully respect the ceasefire agreement,” said Masis Mailian

According to Mailian, in spite of this, the legal base of the ceasefire remains questionable unless the official Baku withdraws its notes, or the Foreign Ministry or the President of Azerbaijan make an official statement about their commitment to the previous agreements.

“If before April war there was prevailing ‘neither peace nor war’ situation in the region, the withdrawal of Azerbaijan from the ceasefire means, that they declare a war to the parties of the agreement, Artsakh and Armenia. The international mediators must urgently restore the legal base of the agreement, without which the discussion of the settlement has no meaning,” said the analyst.

According to him, the UN Secretary-General and mediating countries should be consistent in the issue of the legal basis of the agreement and should get Azerbaijan to restore the contact line of the opposing forces as of May 1994, (status quo post bellum), when the Ceasefire Agreement was signed and the cease-fire line was confirmed. The implementation of this recommendation can be an effective measure of deterrence and a certain guarantee for hostilities not to resume.