By Azernews

By Rashid Shirinov

Distortion of the remarks made by the Russian Foreign Ministry representative is an unimaginable and incomprehensible phenomenon, Spokesperson for the Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry Hikmat Hajiyev told Trend on June 2.

He was responding to the changes in the transcript of the speech by Artyom Kozhin, Deputy Director of the Information and Press Department of the Russian Foreign Ministry.

“As a press secretary of the foreign ministry, I cannot understand the reason for the change in the semantic-linguistic way of my Russian colleague’s professional and diplomatic oral response, which corresponds to the real essence of the negotiation process on the settlement of the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict,” Hajiyev said.

At the press conference on June 1, Kozhin, responding to a question by Trend news agency, said that the statements of Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan on the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict are unconstructive: “In general, loud statements that do not fit onto the appropriate rails, in particular laid by the OSCE, are probably not constructive.”

Hajiyev noted that the video presented by Trend clearly shows that the statement was made in the context of the Armenian prime minister’s remarks about participation of the separatist regime as a side in the negotiations and this step of the Armenian leadership is called unconstructive. However, it is written in the transcript of the press conference, posted on the official website of the Russian Foreign Ministry, that this is the answer to the question of Trend’s reporter, the spokesman said.

Hajiyev added that the assertions of the new government of Armenia about participation in the negotiation process of the separatist regime created in the Azerbaijani territories occupied by Armenia are absolutely unfounded, ridiculous and unconstructive.

“Armenia is responsible as a state that has occupied the territory of Azerbaijan by force and maintains its military presence in the occupied territories. This responsibility under international law automatically makes Armenia a party to the conflict,” he said.

The spokesman added that the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs themselves stated the groundlessness of this position of Armenia at the meeting with Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov in Paris on May 15.

“As can be seen, the new leadership of Armenia, instead of working towards resolving the conflict on the basis of the accepted existing format, with such unfounded allegations is trying to disrupt or paralyze the negotiation process,” Hajiyev noted.

The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict began in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. As a result of the ensuing war, in 1992 Armenian armed forces occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding regions. More than 20,000 Azerbaijanis were killed and over 1 million were displaced as a result of the large-scale hostilities. The 1994 ceasefire agreement was followed by peace negotiations.

Until now, Armenia controls fifth part of Azerbaijan’s territory and rejects implementing four UN Security Council resolutions on withdrawal of its armed forces from Nagorno-Karabakh and surrounding regions.