The settlement of Karabakh conflict by use of force will lead to an outflow of investments from Azerbaijan, according to CIS Institute Director Konstantin Zatulin.

“Should Azerbaijani leadership resort to force to regain control over the ‘Armenian-occupied’ territories, it will be hardly possible to predict the outcome of hostilities. Serious economic problems will be the minimum we can anticipate. Anyway, negotiations are better than war. They help maintain confidence and inspire hope for a peaceful resolution,” Zatulin said, not ruling out possibility that Russia, United States and European Union will impose their conditions on Yerevan and Baku in the end.

“But evidently the conflicting parties will agree to conditions of superpowers while the regional actors – Turkey and Iran – will refrain from voicing their ‘special interests’,” VOA News quotes the expert as saying.

The conflict between Nagorno Karabakh and Azerbaijan broke out in 1988 as result of the ethnic cleansing the latter launched in the final years of the Soviet Union. The Karabakh War was fought from 1991 to 1994. Since the ceasefire in 1994, sealed by Armenia, Nagorno Karabakh and Azerbaijan, most of Nagorno Karabakh and several regions of Azerbaijan around it (the security zone) remain under the control of NKR defense army. Armenia and Azerbaijan are holding peace talks mediated by the OSCE Minsk Group up till now.