Azerbaijan will not make concessions on its territorial integrity, Azerbaijan's Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov said May 4th.
He made the remarks during the meeting of Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the Visegrad Group and of the Eastern Partnership countries in Prague.
"Armenia continues to ignore the calls of the international community for changing the status quo in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict," said the minister. "The provocative actions of Armenian armed forces on the line of contact in early April led to an unprecedented escalation of the situation in the conflict's history."
Azerbaijan has always clearly said that the presence of Armenian armed forces in Azerbaijan's occupied Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts is the main reason of instability and frequent armed clashes on the line of contact, Mammadyarov said.
Recall, on the night of April 2 all frontier positions of Azerbaijan were exposed to heavy fire from large-caliber weapons, mortars, grenade launchers and guns. In addition, Azerbaijani settlements near the front line, densely populated by civilians, were shelled.
The conflict between the two South Caucasus countries began in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. As a result of the ensuing war, in 1992 Armenian armed forces occupied 20% of Azerbaijan, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts.
The two countries signed a ceasefire agreement in 1994. The co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group, Russia, France and the US, are currently holding peace negotiations.
Armenia has not yet implemented the UN Security Council's four resolutions on withdrawal of its armed forces from Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding districts.
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