YEREVAN. – When high-ranking guests visit the region, Azerbaijan conducts some operations just to provoke, military analyst Hrachya Petrosyants told Armenian News-NEWS.am, commenting on the recent such operation, which claimed the lives of three Armenian soldiers and wounded six others.
“Azerbaijan expects for Armenia to respond to this provocation, and for us to retaliate equally or more fiercely, and they will use this in their favor,” he said.
Petrosyants also stressed that the provocations are now against the Republic of Armenia.
“And Armenia is a subject of the international law. In the case when Artsakh [Nagorno-Karabakh] is an unrecognized state, Armenia is a recognized state, and now Azerbaijan conducts diversion operations against a recognized state,” stated Petrosyants.
“If we launch an operation against them now, they will raise uproar at the highest level. And in the case when the international community issues an unclear statement concerning their [i.e., the Azerbaijanis’] operations, it will raise great uproar in the case of the Armenian side’s operations,” the analyst noted, and added that the number-one culpable party in this situation is the international community, which “is unable—or, more correctly, is unwilling—to take strong measures against Azerbaijan.
“We face a dilemma today. We must either be patient or become the victim of provocation. We need to take into to account that if a war starts, there will be hundreds [and] thousands of victims, and the consequences [will be] very severe,” noted Hrachya Petrosyants.
As Armenian News-NEWS.am informed earlier, the MOD issued a statement and noted that on Monday and according to preliminary data, the Azerbaijani side yet again violated the ceasefire at the line of contact between the Armenian-Azerbaijani border, and this time in the northeastern sector. It attempted to infiltrate to the Armenian military bases stationed in the direction of Berdavan and Chinari villages of the Tavush Region.
As a result of the taken measures and the Armenian military servicemen’s courageous operations, however, the diversion advancement was stopped, and the adversary was driven back, giving casualties.
But because of the Azerbaijani operation, Armenian military servicemen Hrach Sargsyan, Zohrab Balabekyan, and Karen Davtyan were killed. There are six wounded.
An investigation is launched.
To note, US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton is commencing her tour to the region on Monday.
