It is no secret that in recent years between Baku and Berlin there has been some friction, and the recriminations and accusations do not stop sounding in the media of Azerbaijan and Germany. However, against this background, more substantial information on Azerbaijani-German relations regarding the position of Germany on the key problem of Azerbaijan, the occupation of Nagorno-Karabakh and the seven surrounding regions hasn't escaped the attention of observers.
So in the 11th report of the Federal Government of Germany on its human rights policy in the world, recently presented to the general public, it is written: "Armenia is responsible for the situation of human rights in accordance with international law belonging to the Azerbaijani territories, including Nagorno-Karabakh, which Armenia has occupied since the conclusion of the Truce in 1994. Hundreds of thousands of Azerbaijani forced migrants cannot go back to those areas to the present day." (See. Page 204 of the report «11. Bericht der Bundesregierung über ihre Menschenrechtspolitik»).
Specific and unambiguous formulations in the report clearly show that the German Foreign Ministry does not believe in the myth, which is persistently circulated by the Armenian side, of "Karabakh statehood." The authorities in Berlin are well aware that the situation of human rights in the occupied territories is not the responsibility of the puppet 'NKR' regime, but of Armenia.
The fact that Germany has openly called Armenia an occupant was another painful blow by the leading European power to the Armenian position in the conflict, according to which the parties are 'Karabakh' and Azerbaijan (paradoxically, at the same time that Armenia does not officially recognize 'NKR'). It is also quite symptomatic that the Berlin authorities do not make any distinction between Nagorno-Karabakh and the other occupied regions, emphasizing thus the equivalent status of "occupied Azerbaijani territories". This approach of Germany rejects the position chosen by Yerevan of a negotiating strategy of "land for status", which involves providing the Baku authorities the independence of Nagorno-Karabakh in exchange for the return of the occupied districts around it.
In the autumn of last year the German government in its response to a parliamentary question from the faction Die Linke also refuted allegations about the self-sufficiency of the 'NKR' Defense Army. Then the German government reported that the 'self-defense forces' of the so-called 'Nagorno-Karabakh Republic' had 23 thousand soldiers. "Of these, 8000 are members of the regular forces of the Republic of Armenia. The bulk of the 'self-defense forces' are made up of 'conscripts', who are mainly recruited from Armenia," the German Foreign Ministry said.
Now the Berlin authorities have explicitly stated that Yerevan is responsible for violating the rights of hundreds of thousands of Azerbaijani citizens expelled from their homes. It is possible that this unambiguous position of the Germans on the Karabakh issue will positively affect the further development of relations between Azerbaijan and Germany.
