KUALA LUMPUR, Oct. 21 -- Azerbaijan had waited almost 30 years for the four United Nations (UN) Security Council resolutions on the issue of Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict and occupied territories to be implemented, said its President Ilham Aliyev.
However, Aliyev said all these resolutions simply remained on paper because there was no political will and no mechanism for the implementation of these resolutions.
"Unfortunately, international law does not work in international relations. If it did, (the) four UN Security Council resolutions would have been implemented long ago," Aliyev said in his nationwide address on Tuesday.
His text of the speech was released by Azerbaijan State News Agency (AZERTAC) and made available by the Azerbaijani Embassy in Malaysia.
The President said that Azerbaijan has made great efforts at the diplomatic level, and the UN General Assembly, the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), the Council of Europe, the European Parliament, the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and other organisations have adopted resolutions.
"The document we have initialled with the European Union also supports the inviolability of our borders, our sovereignty and the territorial integrity of our country. That is the basis for resolving this conflict. This is why the Armenian leadership sends letters to all international organisations day and night, makes statements and asks why they remain silent. Why should they speak up? They have already adopted these resolutions and decisions", Aliyev said.
Aliyev pointed out that the negotiations to solve the conflict did not yield any results for almost 30 years.
"The fortifications Armenia built in the occupied territories show that they did not intend to give up these lands. They simply deceived us and international mediators. Will a country that builds such fortifications, a country that spends so much money on them, ever get out of there? If they wanted to leave, they would not have built them".
"They were simply biding time, while at the same time conducting illegal settlement of the occupied territories. They settled thousands of people (for examples) in the city of Lachin, thousands more in Kalbajar,” he said.
Aliyev said after expelling Azerbaijani citizens from their native lands, "they held a ‘referendum’, which is completely contrary to human morality, laws and international law".
"No-one recognises the so-called ‘Nagorno-Karabakh republic’. Now they are trying to get countries of the world to recognise the so-called criminal entity. They do not understand that no-one will do it. They do not understand that every country that does this can no longer be considered a friendly country for Azerbaijan. Not only that, we will cut all ties with such a country", he said.
Aliyev also accused Armenia of destroying Azerbaijani sites in the occupied territories and trying to erase its historical and cultural heritage.
"Why has the international community not imposed sanctions on the aggressor state for 30 years? I have repeatedly said that sanctions should be imposed", he said.
On the current situation, Aliyev stressed that Azerbaijan conducts military operations on its territory recognised by the international community.
"We do not carry out any operations on the territory of Armenia – we have no such plans – even though they have bombed Ganja twice from the territory of Armenia. We did not respond to them in their fashion. We responded on the battlefield. I said that we would take revenge on them on the battlefield,'’ he said.
According to Aliyev, the Azerbaijani Army is gaining new victories on the battlefield.
" The enemy which has been occupying our lands for almost 30 years, sees the strength of the Azerbaijani Army on the battlefield. We are fighting on our own land, defending our own land, and we will continue to drive the invaders out of our lands," he said.
Aliyev said the occupiers thought that these lands would be occupied forever.
"They changed the names of our cities, changed the borders of our districts, changed the names of our villages, wanted to Armenianise our lands, but could not achieve this. They could not break the will of the Azerbaijani people," he further said.
The president said the Azerbaijani state will do its best to ensure that citizens of Azerbaijan return to the occupied and liberated lands and live there in peace and tranquillity, and that life will be revived in these lands.
"Every Azerbaijani who has not seen their native lands, who opened their eyes to the world after the occupation, lived with a desire to return to these lands," he said.
“The main goal of my activity as President is the return of Azerbaijani lands, the restoration of territorial integrity, and we are doing it on the battlefield today,” Aliyev said.
Background:
The renewed intense military clashes that began on September 27 had resulted in the loss of lives, including civilians on both sides. Both Azerbaijan and Armenia have blamed each other for starting the fighting.
On October 10, both Azerbaijan and Armenia agreed to a Russia-brokered humanitarian ceasefire, allowing an exchange of prisoners and the recovery of dead bodies in Nagorno-Karabakh. Since then, Baku and Yerevan have accused each other of breaching the ceasefire. A new humanitarian ceasefire was agreed by the two countries on October 17.
The latest clash in the South Caucasus region is the most serious one after 2016. In July 2020, the military of the two countries also clashed along their shared border.
The protracted bitter conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia started in 1988 – three years before the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. In 1992, a full-scale war broke out between the two former Soviet states until a ceasefire signed in May 1994. In 1991, the ethnic Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh declared independence but the self-proclaimed Nagorno-Karabakh Republic (NKR) is not recognised by any country in the world.
The mountainous enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh and seven surrounding districts which constitute about 20 per cent of Azerbaijan's territory are internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan, but is under the control of ethnic Armenian forces backed by Armenia.
In the past, the United Nations Security Council had adopted four resolutions, among others calling for the withdrawal of all occupying forces from the areas of Azerbaijan. The OSCE Minsk Group – co-chaired by France, Russia, and the US – was formed in 1992 to find a peaceful solution to the conflict, but to no avail.
-- BERNAMA
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