Armenia denounces Baku for derailing NK talks, calls on NAM member states to respect the peace process
“Armenia deplores the fact that Azerbaijan, the host country of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) Summit and the current Chairman of the Movement, has once again opted for the abuse of its membership in the Movement by promoting misleading, extremely biased narratives on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict in the Outcome Document of the Summit,” Armenia’s foreign ministry reported on Monday in a press statement, reacting to the document adopted at the 18th NAM Summit of the Heads of State and Governments held in Baku.
“The authorities of Azerbaijan, who have perpetrated mass atrocities against the Armenians in Azerbaijan and Nagorno-Karabakh, who have been consistently conducting policies of intolerance and hatred, including by way of public glorification of convicted murderers of the Armenians, who have repeatedly attempted military aggression against Nagorno-Karabakh, bear direct and immediate responsibility for creating existential security risks for the people of Nagorno-Karabakh,” the statement released by the ministry press service said.
It next condemns the Azerbaijani leadership for “a lack of commitment to the peace process conducted under the auspices of the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs… by having opted to yet another forum-shopping exercise in an attempt to derail the ongoing negotiations.
“Armenia firmly supports the inalienable rights of the people of Nagorno-Karabakh to freely determine their political status without limitation and coercion and to freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development. Armenia remains sole security guarantor of the people of Nagorno-Karabakh,” said the statement.
The statement next urges the member states of the Non-Aligned Movement to demonstrate responsibility and respect to the negotiations and to act in line with the spirit, the logic and the course of the peace process based on the norms and principles of international law, the UN Charter and the Helsinki Final Act, including equal rights and self-determination of peoples as one of the key principles for the peaceful settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.