There can be only one pressure on us: it is the pressure from the people; there is no and there can be no other pressure, neither by the superpowers, nor by the authorities of Armenia, nor by political forces and persons. President Arayik Harutyunyan stated this in the National Assembly of Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh).

"I respect everyone's opinions, the opinions that say let's go to a meeting in Baku, there are people who say let's go to a meeting in a different format, there are people who say we should meet to have a dialogue, there are people who we shouldn't meet at all," he said.

"We must work so that the society at least understands that if there is no sugar [in Artsakh] after 10 days, the women working in the market will not come and say, ‘Well, what will happen in the end?’ We have to make a decision for ourselves. Is the main goal for us to have sugar, to drink Coca-Cola, to have beer, or to achieve our goal? If it’s achieving our goal, we shall suffer hardships, and we must realize that," the Artsakh President said.

Harutyunyan announced that there will be no natural gas this winter, as Azerbaijan will do everything to divide the Artsakh society.

"The end will be good, rest assured. That being good is going to depend on us. It will be up to us to exercise our right to self-determination. We started the movement in 1988, the Soviet Union hit us in the head. After that, we resisted, we suffered hardships, we had no sugar, no food, no vegetable oil. The situation was favorable, as a result of war operations, we were able to record success, and a phase came when Karabakh was not only taken into account, but discussed. They used to say: ‘give five regions [to Azerbaijan], keep two for you.’ Today they don’t take [Artsakh] into account because we are not ready, we consider suffering deprivations destructive. We must bring our self-determination to its ultimate goals by suffering deprivations. No one, no political force or person, no international organization can question our right to self-determination. Our right to self-determination is what keeps us here. If it wasn't for the opportunity to exercise our right to self-determination, I wouldn't remain one day in my position. No one can deprive us of the international norm of the right to self-determination," said the Artsakh President.