President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev told Euronews channel about the prospects for a peaceful future of Azerbaijan and Armenia and the conditions for residents of the Karabakh economic region.
The Azerbaijani leader said that due to Yerevan’s delay in the process of discussing a peace treaty, Baku is less optimistic that peace will be achieved before the end of 2023.
"I was optimistic about the timetable, because we exchanged several times with Armenia the comments on the original draft peace treaty, which Azerbaijan elaborated itself. After that, there have been six times of exchange of comments between the two countries," he recalled.
Baku has been waiting for more than two months for a reaction from the Armenian leadership.
"What does that mean? That means that they want to artificially delay the process. Now, we are talking at the end of November, and the hopes for achieving peace and signing peace treaty by the end of the year are not very optimistic. But, I think that the timetable is not so important. Important is the agenda of both countries. It was Azerbaijan, who suffered occupation and ethnic cleansing. Million Azerbaijanis were deported by Armenian government. Devastation of the territory of almost 15,000 square km," Ilham Aliyev said.
Still, Azerbaijan was the country, which proposed to sign a peace agreement and to start working on the delimitation.
"Armenia, now after Karabakh portfolio is closed, I think, will be more willing to come to an agreement with us. Because after the restoration of our sovereignty and elimination of the illegal separatist regime in Karabakh, I think, the main factor, which prevented Armenia to be more courageous on negotiation track, don't exist any longer," Ilham Aliyev said.
In the meantime, the sides are maintaining contact on the working level between different officials and through different channels.
"I think there's no alternative for peace. If peace agreement is not signed that will be very bad for the whole region. We want a region of the Southern Caucasus to get rid of any risks. Of course, we want Armenia, today and in the future, never put under question our territorial integrity, and abandon completely any territorial claims to Azerbaijan," Ilham Aliyev said.
During the negotiation process, Armenia wanted to incorporate into the peace agreement a provision concerning the Armenian minority in Karabakh, the Azerbaijani leader stressed that this is Azerbaijan's internal business.
"If they want to reflect the issue of Armenian minority in Azerbaijan, then, let us reflect the issue of Azerbaijani minority in Armenia, which was expelled thirty years ago. And, there were much more Azerbaijanis in Armenia than Armenians in Azerbaijan - almost 300,000. So, our position was that it must be reciprocal," Ilham Aliyev said.
He stressed that it doesn't matter that "Azerbaijanis were expelled 30 years ago, and Armenians decided to leave two months ago". "The fact is just it must be reciprocal, or we do not comment in our peace agreement about this issue," the head of state said.
Until now, Baku did not get from Armenia any clear understanding on that.
"If Armenia agrees to have either the same language for both national minorities or not to reflect it at all, then the peace is reachable, because this was a main obstacle for Armenia, when they were negotiating with us. So, we will see how it goes. Frankly speaking, I don't see now any serious obstacle to sign a peace agreement from a logical point of view," Ilham Aliyev said.
Azerbaijan wanted Karabakh Armenians to stay in the region. "As to those people who left their homes, first of all, that was their own decision," the president noted, adding that Baku We opened the electronic portal of registration.
"All of those who want to come back have this right. Their property is duly protected. All the historical and religious sites are duly protected. In order to come back they need to comply with certain regulations, and I was saying that many months before the anti-terror operations, those who want to stay need to apply for the Azerbaijani citizenship. Because how can people live in Azerbaijan being a citizen of another country? Either citizenship or work permit, or residence permit," Ilham Aliyev said.
They cannot live in Azerbaijan saying that they live in the “Nagorno-Karabakh republic”, which doesn't exist, the head of state stressed. He added that they have many ethnic groups in Azerbaijan, and all of them live in peace.
"Azerbaijan is a multi-ethnic country, multi-confessional country. We have many ethnic groups in Azerbaijan. Some of these ethnic groups, the number of these ethnic groups, people who belong to them is much bigger than the Armenian population in Karabakh. All of them live in peace, they enjoy all the rights and security. In our proposal to Karabakh Armenians, which was, by the way, published, we also covered their rights. Their right to their language, their education, religion and municipal rights. They can elect their representatives through municipal elections and continue to live there," Ilham Aliyev said.
The decision to leave was their own decision, and according to information, that Baku now has access to, that was a deliberate act of former separatist leaders. Azerbaijan provided "maximum comfort for them to live in peace, unlike Azerbaijanis, who were either killed 30 years ago or deported, tortured and arrested, and some of them had to cross high mountains, and were just frozen to death."
"Several of them already applied for citizenship, and it is now in the process. Some Armenians decided to stay in Karabakh, and now they've been taken care of by our Ministry of Labor and Social Protection of Population and Migration Service," Ilham Aliyev said.
