By Ruzanna Stepanian
STEPANAKERT (Azatutyun) — Nagorno-Karabakh’s leadership dismissed on March 28 a fresh Azerbaijani offer to send its representatives to Baku for talks on the Armenian-populated region’s “reintegration” into Azerbaijan.
It reiterated that Azerbaijani and Karabakh officials should continue to meet at the Karabakh headquarters of Russian peacekeeping forces and discuss, first and foremost, humanitarian issues such as the reopening of the Lachin corridor blocked by Baku for more than three months.
A statement released by the Karabakh Foreign Ministry also insisted on an “internationally recognized negotiation format” for discussing with Baku a broader political settlement of the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict.
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev’s office made the offer on March 27 two days after Azerbaijani troops seized a hill overlooking a dirt road that bypasses the blocked section of the Lachin corridor. The authorities in Stepanakert as well as the Russian peacekeepers accused Baku of violating the Russian-brokered ceasefire that stopped the 2020 war in Karabakh.
The Karabakh statement said the timing of Aliyev’s latest offer shows that Baku is keen to impose solutions on the Karabakh Armenians, rather than negotiate with them in good faith.