Azerbaijan is ready to stop hostilities if Armenia withdraws its army from Nagorno-Karabakh and provides Baku with a plan of its retreat, President of the Republic Ilham Aliyev said on October 4.
“Armenia should establish a schedule for the withdrawal of troops from the occupied Azerbaijani territories in Nagorno-Karabakh, and the Prime Minister of Armenia [Никол Пашинян] I must apologize for our insult, ”he said in an interview with Al Arabiya TV channel.
At the same time, Aliyev stressed that the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict should be resolved through a dialogue between the two states. He also noted that Azerbaijan will try to restore normal relations with the Armenian people.
Earlier in an interview, Aliyev expressed confidence in the existence of a military solution to the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh. At the same time, the Azerbaijani leader reproached the mediators for resolving the situation in Nagorno-Karabakh and international organizations for the fact that over the past 28 years they could not resolve it, but only froze it.
Another aggravation of the military conflict in Karabakh took place on September 27. Armenia and Azerbaijan blamed each other for shelling and death of civilians.
On October 1, leaders of the OSCE Minsk Group countries Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump and Emmanuel Macron issued a joint statement on Karabakh. In it, they condemned the escalation of violence in the region, expressed condolences to the families of the victims and called for an immediate end to hostilities.
Pashinyan welcomed the call of the leaders of the three countries and said that within the framework of the OSCE Minsk Group, the issue of the introduction of Russian peacekeepers into Nagorno-Karabakh could be raised.
Nagorno-Karabakh, in which mainly Armenians live, announced its secession from the Azerbaijan SSR in 1988. During the military confrontation in 1992-1994, Baku lost control of the region.
Since 1992, negotiations have been underway on a peaceful settlement of the conflict within the framework of the OSCE Minsk Group, headed by three co-chairs – Russia, the United States and France.