The terms of the ceasefire in Arsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) and the coming talks were very much on Azerbaijan's terms and left ethnic Armenians looking unprotected. Thomas de Waal, an expert at the Carnegie European Center, told the BBC.

“This looks like the end of a 35-year-old project, some would say a century-old project, of the Armenians of Karabakh to secede from Azerbaijan,” he said.

“We're probably, unfortunately, seeing a project whereby the Azerbaijanis offer so little to the Karabakh Armenians that most if not all of them will leave.”