Question: Mr. Kocharyan, in practice, every day not only threats to launch military operations are sounded in Baku, including the highest level statements, but also claims are issued to the territories of both the Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh and Republic of Armenia. How do you comment this?

Answer:  It is obvious that the leadership of Azerbaijan have completely fallen into hysteria. That kind of hysteria is a logical result of the deadlocked policy of continuous infringements of fundamental principles of international law and the history of the region, nature and causes of the Karabakhi-Azerbaijani conflict trying unsuccessfully to lay its own responsibility for the consequences of unleashed aggression against self-determined Nagorno-Karabakh on the Armenian sides. That hysteria is also the inglorious outcome of the policy of rattling the saber, conducting of hatred propaganda against all Armenians and barbaric destruction of cultural-historical heritage of the Armenians and other peoples in the region. Such a policy makes Azerbaijan a threat to the regional stability and security, and first of all, for Azerbaijan itself.

It is time for Baku to stop, since Azerbaijan, buried in falsifications, stands on the verge of an abyss.

Question: Do you agree with the claims of the Azerbaijani official propaganda that the policy of running government is the continuation of the course of Heydar Aliyev's foreign policy?

Answer: Aliyev junior inherited the power from his father, but at least in case of the Karabakhi-Azerbaijani conflict, he has inherited his policy from Elcibey. Once, Elcibey also threatened to put an end to Karabakh, occupy Zangezur and other Armenian territories, and it is well known how that adventurous policy of Azerbaijan ended.

Heydar Aliyev recognized the Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh as a party to the conflict by authorizing the Azerbaijan's Vice Speaker, Deputy Prime Minister, Defense Minister and Head of General Staff to conduct direct negotiations with their counterparts from the NKR. In 1993 he personally had negotiations with the leader of NKR Robert Kocharian in Moscow and in those direct contacts established the basis for signing of a cease-fire agreement between the Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh and Azerbaijan in 1994, which was later joined by the Republic of Armenia.

Whenever Azerbaijan really needs the negotiations to have results, it contact with NKR and does not try to deny its existence, as the current leadership of Azerbaijan tries to do. It is not by chance that Heydar Aliyev was trying to reach a full settlement of the conflict through compromises. He realized who would inherit his power, and conflict how dangerous that heritage could be for Azerbaijan in case of an unsettled conflict.

Question: If we accept that the foreign policy is a continuation of internal policy, what internal processes are dictating such kind of course to Baku in your opinion?

Answer: First of all, it is the desire to preserve the power, in such conditions when he failed to inherit his father's reputation together with the power. On the background of events in a number of Islamic countries, which can move to Azerbaijan, the passing of the third presidential term for him becomes problematic.

Ilham Aliyev can not declare, as once the NKR’s President Arkady Ghukasian did, that he has Constitutional basis to go to a third term, but he does not do it giving preference to harmonious conscience - the outlook is different and values are different, and the gap between his activities and morality is irresistible.

Thus one agrees with the assessment that in the unsteady conditions of staying on the top of the pyramid where clans are competing for the distribution of incomes gained from energy resources, the militant statements made by Aliev in external field are in fact addressed to the internal audience in order to compensate the lack of a reputation in his circle. It is also a signal for a part of the society that any statement against his regime serves to the interests of the external enemy. The reality is that Azerbaijan's leadership could find no factor to unite his people around the hereditary regime except the simple Armenophobia, isn’t it?

Question: Don’t you think that the hatred policy against the Armenian people is making more difficult the implementation of the idea of good-neighborly relations between the regional states.

Answer: Of course, it is not by chance that in Azerbaijan, unlike Armenia and Georgia, the works and even name of a great humanitarian Sayat Nova is neglected, a man who is a symbol of good-neighborliness and mutual respect of people in the region. Another symbol was moved forward instead - Ramil Safarov with an axe in his hands and hidden walking around the world. But I would not like to think that the entire Azerbaijani society is ready to devour propaganda lures aimed at maintaining the regime of inheritance.

Question: In the above-mentioned conditions, do you think it is possible to reach any progress in this stage of Karabakhi-Azerbaijani conflict?

Answer: it is possible if Azerbaijan stops using the negotiations as a veil for the development of anti-Armenian hysteria and the propaganda aimed at of the falsification of the nature and causes of the conflict, and demonstrates his commitment to resume the negotiations with the Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh, ceases his threats that do not scare anyone, and starts implementing the documents which he has signed and is party to.

It is obvious that although Azerbaijan is pretending that does not see the self-determined Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh, he sooner or later has to accept the following obvious facts (if of course he is not seeking the maintenance of status-quo, but its changing):

a)The NKR was formed on the basis of expression of people's free will in accordance with the existing legislation of the Soviet Union and the fundamental norms of international law, b) the people of the NKR has proven his capacity to build a sustainable state, even in the conditions of resisting Azerbaijan's armed aggression, c) the NKR is a state with democratic Constitution adopted by the entire people, democratic country with the change of power through regular state and municipal elections that are observed by international observers, d) the NKR’s leadership does not mourn from all the tribunes about its territories under Azerbaijan’s occupation as a result of the latter’s aggression, feeling sure that the NKR’s control over its territories will be restored and willingly through the negotiations.

Even if Azerbaijan makes efforts to show that the nature of the conflict is a territorial dispute between Armenia and Azerbaijan, it will have to admit its responsibility for the ethnic cleansings against the self-determined people of Nagorno-Karabakh and for the armed aggression involving international terrorist organizations’ fighters against the Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh.

As for Armenia, it has been and remains the guarantor of the security of NKR and its population; it has built and will build its relations with the NKR as a de-facto established state. Although the issue has been and still remains on the agenda, Armenia has not recognized the independence of the NKR de jure taking into account the importance of solving the issue within the frameworks of peaceful negotiations. Participating at the negotiations conducted by the mediation of the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs, Armenia intends to promote the progress of the settlement of the issue, but it cannot substitute itself for NKR. The real progress in the settlement is possible only when NKR is engaged into the negotiation process as a full participant.

Question: What will happen if Azerbaijan continues its destructive policy?

Answer: In that case, the international recognition of the NKR will follow. There is no need to name the similar precedents as they are not precedents, but regularities.