EuFoA: new Karabakh shootings prove war risk

PanARMENIAN.Net - After meetings with security experts, NGO representatives and officials in Nagorno Karabakh, European Friends of Armenia (EuFoA) Secretary General Michael Kambeck commented in the incident at the contact line of Artsakh and Azerbaijani armed forces on June 18 night.

"This was a dangerous and risky maneuver, apparently initiated by Azerbaijan. It looks like President Aliyev was unhappy about the peace talks in St. Petersburg on June 17 and ordered his troops to take a small village and send the painful signal that he is serious about his repeated war threats," he said.

The EuFoA stated that Azerbaijani claims that the initiative started from Nagorno Karabakh and that Karabakhi troops entered deep into their territory do not make sense for three reasons: 1. Both forces are in this place only a few hundred meters away from each other. No small Armenian commando could break through, and Azerbaijan has been behind similarly planned tactical reconnaissance operations in recent months. 2. Azerbaijan has in this place one of its strongest defense positions, to protect the town of Tartar, which is only 3km away. 3. The bodies of the killed soldiers have been found on the Armenian side of the security buffer zone controlled by the Nagorno Karabakh Defense Force. For that reason, according to unofficial sources from Azerbaijan and N-K, the body of the Azeri commando is still in Nagorno Karabakh.

"The EU cannot and should not interfere in the OSCE Minsk Group process. But since the situation is still tense on the contact line, we definitely need to think about other instruments now, just to avoid a second Georgian War. We also need to insist on the consolidation of the ceasefire regime by removing snipers and installing observers on both sides. There is no time to wait." Mr. Kambeck said.