Political scientist: 'Azerbaijan was forced to start local anti-terrorism measures'

Azerbaijan was forced to begin local anti-terrorist measures. The last straw, of course, was the sabotage in the Khojavand region, where civilians and employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs were killed by a recently planted mine, Russian political expert Evgeny Mikhailov said, Report informs.

Mikhailov noted that these events were expected: “It was a matter of time, because Yerevan made every effort to encourage Azerbaijan to take forceful action. Yerevan announced that peace would be signed, and Azerbaijan hoped for the signing of a peace treaty this year, but third players, namely the United States and France, were not interested in Russia being the main moderator of the peacekeeping process."

According to the expert, Armenia is trying to sit on several chairs: “Yerevan held a joint exercise with America and states that the peacekeepers do not fulfill the conditions under which they are in the region. The peacekeepers are there and fulfill all the conditions that were signed in November 2020. They are primarily concerned with ensuring the safety of the civilian population."

The political scientist emphasized that Azerbaijan warned the peacekeepers and the Russian-Turkish monitoring center about the start of the anti-terrorist measures: “Baku, by the way, having started anti-terrorist measures, warned both the peacekeepers and the Russian-Turkish center that the civilian population would not be harmed, only terrorists and their infrastructure."

He noted that Russia will make every effort to resolve the situation. “But you need to understand that there will be no peace treaty shortly,” the expert added.