Taking Lost Positions at the Moment will Simply be Illiteracy: Vagharshak Harutyunyan

Vagharshak Harutyunyan, Former Defense Minister of Armenia, says the Vienna meeting was the political victory of the Armenian side. “There is no need to separate military or political victory, no matter we had lost territories or not, which, of course, is not good. We should assess this meeting from the militarypolitical point of view since, regardless of our territorial losses, our army prevailed during the April war: we actually thwarted the Azerbaijani army’s plan and proved that despite the large expenses of the Azerbaijani army, it did not become stronger and failed. The military solution of the Karabakh conflict is a closed topic for Azerbaijan,” he stated.

He said it is important that the lost 800 hectares territory is not populated and has no military significance. “Of course, having lost territories is not good, however, everyone should understand and trust the Army. Many people say they should go and return the territories, however, what can be achieved from this? We’ll get to the point, that Azerbaijan will more strengthen those positions, and taking them at the moment will simply be illitaeracy. I am confident that our army will develop a respective plan on time and will implement it,” Harutyunyan said.

Referring to the question why Azerbaijan agreed to participate in the meeting, former Defense Minister said: “The aim of the Azerbaijani attacks were these negotiations, since they hoped with such means the Minsk Group would make a proposal of giving Nagorno Karabakh to Azerbaijan, however, they did not reach their goal, and Azerbaijan was forced to take part in this meeting and agreed over the installation of ceasefire mechanisms,” Minister said.