President of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan advised that Azerbaijani delegate to PACE should calm down and stop distorting his words.
“I was a participant in the just struggle of the people of Nagorno-Karabakh. Why did I not mention the incidents in Khojaly, which you call a genocide? It was for the simple reason that immediately after those painful events, Ayaz Mutallibov, President of the Republic of Azerbaijan, stated, in great detail and an informed way, facts that clearly showed who actually organised and carried out those massacres,” President said responding to Samed Seidov’s question.
“Genocide is not a good thing. Surviving a genocide is not an honour; it is a suffering. I very much regret the trend in Azerbaijan to want whatever the Armenians have had. This is impermissible. Why do you need to call something that never occurred – and, in particular, that was not carried out by the Armenians – a genocide?
As to those international organisations, the commitments we assumed and our fulfilment of them, you are simply wrong. There is no international organisation that would have adopted a decision that would have been rejected by Armenia. You tried to recall the United Nations Security Council resolutions. My advice to you, when you go into a topic, would be to really go into it and study it. The world knows that the United Nations Security Council has never discussed the issue of Nagorno-Karabakh. In 1993, the United Nations Security Council adopted four resolutions on stopping hostilities in the Nagorno-Karabakh area. After each resolution, Azerbaijan said it would not stop the fighting. It attempted new offensives and attacks, but as usual it suffered losses. In those four resolutions, the only commitment on Armenia was to use its reputation, authority and influence to get the hostilities to stop. To the credit of the then Government of Armenia, we honoured this one commitment. Azerbaijan – the one responsible for the hostilities – failed to stop the fighting.
As you know, in 1994, the cease-fire agreement was signed, but it was signed under the influence of other factors, not the United Nations Security Council resolution. Unfortunately, the provisions of that cease-fire agreement are not being honoured. The agreement clearly states that the hostilities need to stop, and for a political solution, an extensive process of talks must be launched. As your own words clearly illustrate, you want the most in this process of negotiation – you want what is impossible. You want to return Karabakh to Azerbaijan. Unfortunately, xenophobia in Azerbaijan has gone so far that you are explicitly saying that you need Karabakh, but without the Armenians. That is impossible. It is never going to happen.
The essence of the struggle of the people of Nagorno-Karabakh is very simple. It is a struggle for liberty and self-determination, and I am sure that that struggle cannot have anything but a positive outcome.”
