Expert: Approaches to Azerbaijan’s sovereignty should be within int’l law, and not contrary to it

Attempts by the world community to regulate the actions of a sovereign state and decide for it what to pass through its border and what not is unacceptable, and is nothing more than a manifestation of double standards in relation to Azerbaijan. Approaches to sovereign rights should be within the international law, and not contrary to it, Pakistani analyst in the field of international relations Khalid Taimur Akram told Report.

He was commenting on the situation around Azerbaijan’s border checkpoint on the Armenia-Azerbaijan border on the Lachin road.

The expert noted that Azerbaijan’s decision not to let the convoy of trucks through the Lachin checkpoint, which was not agreed in advance, is the country’s legal right. Moreover, Azerbaijan proposed to use the Aghdam-Khankandi road to supply the Armenian population in Karabakh, he said.

“Azerbaijan has repeatedly proposed using an alternative road for the delivery of humanitarian cargo, but this proposal was not accepted. Moreover, the separatists in Karabakh demonstratively blocked this road with concrete bricks. The decision to let any cargo into its territory from Armenia is the sovereign right of Azerbaijan. No other country has the right to interfere in its internal affairs,” he added.

According to Taimur Akram, the same organizations and countries that today object to Azerbaijan’s right to control its borders demanded in 2014 that Russia, intending to send a humanitarian convoy to the Donbass, respect the territorial integrity of Ukraine and its sovereignty.

“In 2014, even before the Russian invasion of Ukraine, in a similar way, Russia made an attempt to transfer military cargo to the Donetsk and Luhansk regions of Ukraine under the guise of humanitarian aid. The same countries that require Azerbaijan to let through numerous Armenian vehicles with dubious cargo, 9 years ago demanded that Moscow show respect for the sovereignty of Ukraine. International organizations and individual countries should apply the same approach to Baku, Kyiv, Moscow and Yerevan,” he said.