The people in Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh) are resolutely opposed to any plan proposing peace instead of their own lands, a member of the second Armenian republic’s National Assembly has said, commenting on President Serzh Sargsyan’s recent meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“It is an open secret that neither Azerbaijan nor Nagorno-Karabakh is ready for a mutual concession. That’s especially true for people in Artsakh, as the events in April demonstrated yet another time that even the most insignificant concession would impose on us a new war instead of bringing peace, as more military operations will get under way. So the people in Nagorno-Karabakh remain unwavering; we are not ready to cede an inch of land to anyone. We are simply obliged to keep the borders achieved at the price of our friends and sons’ blood,” Rudik Hyusnunts, the head of the Nagorno-Karabakh National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Foreign Relations, told Tert.am.
Highlighting the international community’s interest in achieving final peace, the lawmaker said he thinks that the negotiations will be ongoing to enable them to properly develop the economic and political relations.
“These are now desires, but in order to realize them, we at times need many years of work. The two societies must prepare themselves for a reconciliation and co-existence as neighbors. But the Azerbaijani authorities won’t translate those elements into action,” he noted.
Asked to comment on President Putin’s call on Armenia and Azerbaijan to accept mutual concessions that would signal neither victory nor defeat, Mr Hyusnunts said, “Why don’t they resolve the problem over Donbas? What about Abkhazia and South Ossetia? To be frank, Russia is undertaking a tremendous burden; though I agree that it is strong as an empire … The Artsakh people are a powerful unit; it is up to us to us to decide who to co-exist with and how to live.”