Pashinyan: Russian peacekeeping forces in Nagorno-Karabakh do not fulfill the mission undertaken by trilateral statement

YEREVAN, September 4. /ARKA/. Russian peacekeeping forces in Nagorno-Karabakh do not fulfill the mission undertaken by the trilateral statement of November 9, 2020, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said in an interview with Italian publication La Repubblica, when asked to explain the political situation that keeps the Russians from implementing the trilateral statement.

'Essentially, one of the main objectives of the presence of the Russian peacekeepers in Nagorno Karabakh was to ensure the security of the civilian population. In this case security involves the freedom of movement, and this right is not implemented, which is a matter of concern,' Pashinyan said.

'Our Russian colleagues argue that Armenia’s western partners, western countries work with Armenia or push its government to take measures, whose objective is to push out Russia from this region. But when we talk with our Russian partners, sometimes we express our opinion and our assessment that it’s the opposite; we see that Russia by virtue of a number of steps it takes or fails to take, itself leaves the region. As for the reasons, we are unaware. We can of course make interpretations, but I cannot make any statement. I can propose hypothesis, but I will refrain from that now... But there are processes which of course lead us to believe that all this scenarios may repeat, we just can wake up one day and see that Russia is not here,' Pashinyan said.

Pashinyan also said that 'in general terms, 'we never concealed and I talked about this at the recent Cabinet meeting, that by our observation and assessment the purpose of Azerbaijan is to rid Nagorno-Karabakh of Armenians. This is the reason why they have created an artificial humanitarian crisis by unlawfully blocking the Lachin Corridor. Essentially, the Lachin Corridor issue should have been resolved, you may know that the International Court of Justice has made a binding legal ruling imposing it upon Azerbaijan to ensure bilateral traffic from Nagorno Karabakh to Armenia and from Armenia to Nagorno Karabakh for citizens, vehicles and freight. But this ruling was passed on February 22, 2023 and was reaffirmed on July 6, 2023 is not being followed. This comes to prove following the humanitarian crisis in Nagorno Karabakh that, if we can say so, this is a crisis of the international legal order, if a binding ruling of the ICJ is not being implemented, such a conclusion may follow.'-0-