Azerbaijani Ambassador to London Elin Suleymanov responded to a new article by The Guardian columnist Patrick Wintour, urging to abandon pessimistic narrative around the Armenian-Azerbaijani settlement process, because the situation has radically changed recently, most importantly, for the better.
A week earlier, The Guardian published an article by journalist Patrick Wintour, the diplomatic editor of this British newspaper. It's not the first time the Azerbaijani Ambassador to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland has had to respond to this columnist's articles, which are sometimes inaccurate or misleading and give readers the wrong impression.
Patrick Wintour was among several British journalists who interviewed Nikol Pashinyan on April 22. Later, on April 30, he published an article titled 'Armenia turns towards west in search of allies amid Azerbaijan tensions' was published, written in the usual biased language.
Elin Suleymanov noted that Patrick Wintour’s article offers an oddly dark view, which is inappropriate, since when describing his visit to Armenia, the journalist focused solely on the negative things. Meanwhile, for the first time since gaining independence, Baku and Yerevan have reached a "breakthrough" agreement to begin delimiting the border between the two South Caucasus republics. The Azerbaijani envoy recalled that this move was widely praised by the international community and advocated for by Armenian PM Nikol Pashinyan.
“Moreover, he fails to mention that the main reason for hostilities and instability over the years was the 30-year illegal occupation of the internationally recognised Azerbaijani lands by Armenia,” Elin Suleymanov writes.
He also pointed out that Wintour incomprehensibly described the recent return of four Azerbaijani villages in the Gazakh region, previously occupied by Armenia and clearly located on the territory of the Republic of Azerbaijan, as acknowledged by all existing maps and even Armenian officials, but which were occupied by Armenia, as “ceded” to Azerbaijan.
“Wintour is right, however, about Armenia’s history of perpetual and futile search for allies outside the region, while a lasting peace requires normalisation with immediate neighbours,” the Azerbaijani diplomat emphasizes. The Azerbaijani Ambassador in the UK has added that Patrick Wintour was also correct to quote an ethnic Armenian resident of Azerbaijan’s Karabakh region referring to separatists urging local Armenians to leave by stoking fears and ethnic division.
“Perhaps, it is time to abandon narratives of doom and gloom, and support the remarkable progress that Azerbaijan and Armenia are making towards peace,” Emin Suleymanov concluded.
