Aliyev Accuses Armenians of Barbarism While Talking about Making Peace

Aliyev disclosed how Azerbaijan blocked the delivery of weapons to Armenia during the 2020 war: “We publicly said many times that arms during the 44-day war regularly — they have several a day cargo planes carrying weapons from Russia to Armenia. We traced all the routes from Rostov and Mozdok. We asked our Georgian friends to block the airspace, and they did. Also, we asked our Georgian friends to block the land route from Russia to Georgia to transport weapons to Armenia, and they did it also, and we are grateful. We sent letters to all Caspian littoral states not to allow Russian cargo planes carrying weapons to Armenia. We sent [letters] to Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Iran. But unfortunately, these planes were using the territory of these countries entering Armenia.”

Aliyev also ridiculed Armenia and the Diaspora for thinking “that the whole world owes them everything, and someone will come and defend them, someone will come and fight for them, someone will come and give them money and everything, and they will sit and exploit their questionable and doubtful so-called tragedy.”

President Aliyev accused Armenians of planting mines right before evacuating the territories they had lost to Azerbaijan in the war, after Armenia “signed the act of capitulation” on Nov. 10, 2020: “We gave them 10-20 days to leave the territories they had to leave based on the agreement signed on November 10. But, they used it to plant mines, burn houses they did not build but settled in, cut trees, and [cause] other ecological disasters.” He said that during that same period, Armenians “destroyed 30 hydroelectric power plants.”

Aliyev falsely claimed that Azerbaijan is a tolerant, multicultural country. He cited as an example the existence of an Armenian Church in the center of Baku. “There are five thousand Armenian books” in the Church, he said, hiding the fact that the Church no longer functions as a house of worship, but a library.

Aliyev assured his guests that “Armenians who live in Karabagh, we consider them our citizens. We hope that they will also soon understand that living as citizens of Azerbaijan, they will have all rights, and their security will be protected. Azerbaijan, unlike Armenia, is a multi-ethnic country. All ethnic groups who live here, including Armenians, live in peace and dignity. We have an Armenian minority and they never had any issue in that respect.” Aliyev is hoping that everyone forgot about the repeated massacres of thousands of Armenians in Azerbaijan.

Aliyev claimed that Azerbaijan “is already getting some messages from Armenians in Karabagh — very positive messages. We already started some preliminary contacts on different levels. Don’t want to go into much details, but it already started, and this once again demonstrates our intention. They can be part of the rapid economic development, they can feel themselves much more safe, secure and comfortable within the unified Azerbaijani state, but they need to put down their separatist trends and separatist aspirations.”