Azerbaijan on Tuesday, July 4 violated the ceasefire on the contact line with Nagorno Karabakh (Artsakh), using various caliber mortars and even employed a TR-107 rocket engine in the south of the frontline. Artsakh Defense Army opened retaliatory fire to suppress the rival’s attacks. During the incident, two civilians - a 52-year-old woman and a 2-year-old girl from Azerbaijan - were killed. This is not the first time Baku’s adventurism results in human losses - including among civilians - and impermissible human rights violations and war crimes in Karabakh, and is certainly not the last time.

Children from Talish village of the Nagorno Karabakh Republic now live in Charentsavan, far from their own home. PanARMENIAN.Net met with the refugee families and talked to the kids.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has been persistent in expressing his displeasure with the OSCE Minsk Group. However, his spasms of discontent were interspersed with bouts of civilized communication with the mediators - no boycotting of talks or declining of meetings.

The longer powers interested in the Karabakh conflict settlement, international organizations and the OSCE Minsk Group mediators keep silent, the more uncontrollable Azerbaijan becomes, trying to turn the situation in the conflict zone into a full-scale war.

The University of Birmingham hosted a round-table discussion on the Nagorno Karabakh conflict Nov 26, followed by a seminar The Challenges and Choices of the South Caucasus: Between Political, Cultural and Economic Priorities hosted by a Russian expert Denis Dvornikov. Later, several Armenian media outlets hurried to slam the event, accusing the organizers of bias. The expert commented on the situation amid the media scandal.

Zhengyalov Hats, a combination of various types of greens with dough is one of the most famous dishes in Artsakh cuisine. There are different Zhengyalov Hats recipes with a mix of up to 20 kinds of greens. Beyond Karabakh, it’s very popular in Armenian towns of Kapan and Goris. In some areas, it’s also made with nettle.

The co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group are going to visit the region following the meeting between foreign ministers of Armenia and Azerbaijan. According to the OSCE MG French co-chair Jacques Faure, this is almost settled, and the negotiations are due to be held in the nearest future.

After the resolutions on Iran, Syria, Belarus, Greece, and the financial-economic crisis in general, the EU decided to also refer to the Karabakh problem. Adoption of a document on Armenia by the Foreign Affairs Committee of the European Parliament, in which it proposes to replace the French mandate with the mandate of EU in the OSCE Minsk Group, looks at least odd from the legal point of view. European Union is a separate international structure that has nothing to do with the OSCE, and in this case it is necessary to replace not only France, but also the United States and Russia, if not the institute of co-chairs at all.

The forthcoming regular visit of the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs to the region is already calling for comments and all kinds of assumptions about the object of the visit. However, this visit, as well as all previous ones, will not give any new results. It will only be intriguing if Baku once again speaks of the “inadmissibility of France to co-chair the Minsk Group”. But such a development is rather unlikely, since it is one thing to speak following in the footsteps of Turkish politics, and another - to report the French directly. All the more so when Baku understands the futility and ridiculousness of such proposals.

The Republic of Artsakh celebrates its 20th anniversary of declaration of independence. But the conflict is as far from being settled as it was in 1994, at the end of the national liberation war. Unfortunately, the Nagorno-Karabakh, or rather the Azerbaijani-Karabakh conflict has long been an instrument in the hands of the world powers to solve their own problems. And any expert or politician knowledgeable about the problem knows it perfectly well that no regulation is possible in the coming 2-3 years, or even more.