Azernews.Az

By Sara Rajabova

Azerbaijan’s foreign policy head has said the country continues facing the policy of double standards of the European countries.

Elmar Mammadyarov made the remarks during the briefing following the meeting with Didier Reynders, the head of the committee of ministers of the Council of Europe and Belgian foreign minister in Baku on April 28.

Mammadyarov urged the European institutions to pay a great attention to the issue of restoring the Azerbaijani borders that were violated as a result of the Armenian aggression, as well as the problems of refugees and IDPs.

The European politician, for his part, highlighted the fact of occupation of Azerbaijan’s Nagorno-Karabakh, expressing concern over the incidents along the contact line of Armenian-Azerbaijani troops.

The Armenian armed forces regularly take moves that lead to increase of tension on the contact line of two countries’ troops. The armed skirmishes along the line of contact between Armenian and Azerbaijani military forces often result with the killings or wounding of servicemen from both sides.

“We discussed the situation with neighbor country and the occupation of Nagorno-Karabakh, because we are concerned about incidents along the contact line and we will be very pleased to see some progress in the discussions among the two neighboring countries. Of course, military issue related to the occupation and the problem to be solved in the line of Minsk Group,” Reynders said.

Prior to his Baku trip, Reynders visited Yerevan, where he said the mission to support the settlement of the conflict lies with the OSCE Minsk Group.

Reynders noted that there is no military solution to conflict, adding a decision should be taken through political means within the framework of the OSCE Minsk Group.

In Baku, he also drew attention to the problem of refuges and IDPs that Azerbaijan has been facing over two decades due to ethnic cleansing against and the occupation of 20 percent of its internationally recognized territories by Armenia.

Reynders went on to note that while the refugee problems spark wide range of discussions in Europe, Azerbaijan’s one million displaced persons have remained out of the attention.

“I was very interested to pay tribute to the displaced people in the country. It is my first visit and I know that you have around one million people - coming from Armenia and coming from Nagorno-Karabakh,” he said.

The bloody war, which flared up in the late 1980s due to Armenia's territorial claims against its South Caucasus neighbor, left 700,000 civilians of Nagorno-Karabakh and the regions adjoining it, as well as the regions bordering with Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh without homes.

Moreover, 250,000 Azerbaijanis were expelled from Armenia and became refugees due to Armenia's ethnic cleansing policy after the emergence of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict with Azerbaijan.

“I have seen different places and I am sure that it is important when we are coming here we take the time to go to those places to have a good idea about the size of the problem, because just to be concrete, when we receive some refugees on European continent we have huge discussions. When you have one million displaced persons, I totally understand it is another kind of situation,” Reynders said.

Back in 1992, following a violent and bloody conflict, Armenia occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts plunging the South Caucasus region into a protracted conflict. Armenia has yet to comply with UN Security Council resolutions calling for the liberation of all occupied territories.

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Sara Rajabova is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @SaraRajabova

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