As long as the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is not resolved, shootings and deaths of soldiers and civilians on the frontline and the borders of Armenia and Azerbaijan will continue, the historian and political analyst, Candidate of Historical Sciences, Oleg Kuznetsov, said in an interview with a 'Vestnik Kavkaza' correspondent, commenting on the agreement reached at a meeting in Vienna between the presidents Ilham Aliyev and Serzh Sargsyan on maintaining the ceasefire in accordance with the agreements reached in 1994-1995.
Above all, the expert urged not to overestimate the meeting. "The negotiations in Vienna are in a number of similar diplomatic summits of the past – they all led to declarations of good intentions that have never been fulfilled. Moreover, after the end of each meeting we have observed a surge of military activity on the frontline for 20 years. I think that the meeting is typical, and the last's night situation when one Azerbaijani and one Armenian soldiers were killed proves the fact that the tension in the conflict zone hasn't decreased and it won't decrease until the two warring sides are belligerents countries,'' he explained.
The political analyst also noted the organization of negotiations. "I have an impression that the meeting in Vienna was in the way that the official Yerevan played the role of peacemaker, though we all know well that it is wrong. The initiative of the meeting was firstly announced in Yerevan, then Moscow supported it after half the day. Azerbaijan is not satisfied with this position, and the mediation mission of the OSCE Minsk group failed once again. Accordingly, the organization of the meetings and its format do not correspond to the objective reality,'' Oleg Kuznetsov underlined.
The key point should not be overshadowed by the Vienna meeting, as the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict still remains the war that continues according its own laws. "In any case, there will be regular exchanges of fire, as this is the only way to detect changes enemy's positions of firing points. It is impossible to say that we won't hear a single shot. It is impossible because soldiers in trenches, will have to ensure their own safety sooner or later," the expert warned.
"The surveillance cameras may partially obstruct the activities of subversive and intelligence groups, snipers and infantry in the first line of trenches, but it doesn't mean that the artillery, armored forces and drones will be limited in their actions. Without technical control methods of warfare will become more insidious and sophisticated," Oleg Kuznetsov added, stressing that the situation will not change until the conditions of the end of the war, not the conditions of the suspension of fire.
"Due to these reasons the situation in the zone of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict will remain unchanged after the talks between Ilham Aliyev and Serzh Sargsyan in Vienna. The activation of international observers, the installation of technical monitoring systems only stimulate the sides to more sophisticated fighting bypassing the international control. It was so and it will always be,'' the political analyst concluded.
In this connection, the faster a comprehensive agreement on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is signed and the key issues are resolved, the less victims will be on both sides and the more reliable the transition from military confrontation to a peaceful settlement will be guaranteed.
Recall that the situation is aggravated due to extremely provocative shelling of the Azerbaijani civilians, living along the border of the occupied territories of Nagorno-Karabakh and seven adjacent districts, which are now parched and desolated lands nowadays.
