President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev has commented on Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s statement that over 2,000 mercenaries from the Middle East are currently in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict zone.

Aliyev said the following in an interview with Spain’s EFE agency:

“I regret that the top officials of countries that need to maintain neutrality and act based on the mandate given by the OSCE are citing unverified information and what is whispered. Over a month has passed, but there is still no evidence, document or argument. There are only statements. Why are they shutting an eye to what is happening on the Armenian side and how many mercenaries are fighting on the Armenian side? Why aren’t Russia and France accusing us and not saying anything about that?

This is a discriminatory approach that we can’t agree with since it doesn’t correspond to the mandate of the Co-Chairs. I have said several times that the mediators need to maintain neutrality. If they support one side, it’s their problem, but in that case they need to refuse to mediate. If we start accusing those who are accusing us of having mercenaries and of all that they are doing in different parts of the world, this will be a very long conversation. We don’t do this. This is exactly why we expect the same from our colleagues,” Aliyev said and accused Russia of supplying weapons to Armenia.