Ilham Aliyev: Azerbaijan and Armenia have closed the page of war

Azerbaijan and Armenia have decided to close the page of war, President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev said speaking at a panel discussion held as part of the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum.

According to Report's correspondent in Davos, the head of state noted that the continuation of the war could have led to very bad consequences.

"I believe that everything is in our hands. Everything depends on your agenda, on your vision, on a strategic vision of the future. Returning to the topic of peace with Armenia and the 30 years of conflict that preceded it, we truly went through extremely difficult times-as a state and as a nation: the loss of territories, a million people who became refugees and internally displaced persons. But we did not lose hope. We did not lose the courage and determination to restore justice, international law, and our sovereignty," he noted.

The president emphasized that it took Azerbaijan 30 years to restore justice.

"International institutions-30 years ago, 20 years ago, 10 years ago, and even now-essentially did not change their behavior. We changed. We stopped believing that someone would come and solve our problems for us. All our hopes for international mediation completely collapsed. The UN Security Council-the highest international body-adopted four resolutions demanding the withdrawal of Armenian troops from our territory. These resolutions remained on paper. The OSCE and other international institutions adopted numerous resolutions and decisions, but none of them materialized until we took the situation into our hands. We did it. We restored justice, international law, our territorial integrity, and our sovereignty. After that, we achieved peace and we stopped. And for the leader of a country that suffered for 30 years, stopping at the right moment is an extremely responsible and important decision," he said.

Ilham Aliyev added: "I want to be absolutely frank with you and with the audience. We could have continued, but that would have led to endless wars, to even greater suffering and new victims. Then the war would never have ended. And someone had to stop it. We made the decision to stop. Yes, it was a joint decision by the leadership of Armenia and Azerbaijan-to close this page and seize the opportunities for peace."