Azerbaijani military build-ups remain in Artsakh line of contact – acting defense minster

Nothing has changed in the Artsakh-Azerbaijan line of contact and the Azerbaijani build-up of military equipment remain the same, acting defense minister of Armenia Vigen Sargsyan said at a press briefing. Sargsyan noted than tension isn’t manifested in intensity of gunfire, but by build-ups.

“The Armed Forces continue fully controlling the situation, and are ready to give countermeasures to any actions, as required by the interests of our country”, he said.

In response to a question as to why the defense ministry didn’t react to opposition MP from Yelk faction Sasun Michaelyan’s allegations from the parliament’s floor on questioning the credibility of the ministry’s statements on the Azerbaijani build-up, Sargsyan noted that the counterstatement to the ministry’s statement is full with several dangers, one being the possible decrease of trust for future statements.

“In addition, during those days I didn’t get no calls from neither Sasun Michaelyan, nor Nikol Pashinyan or anyone else who would call and ask what grounds these statements had, maybe something really must be done. I find it normal, but counterstatements on this background are wrong. The military’s statements can’t be associated with domestic developments,” he said.

On April 22, the military of Artsakh released footage from the line of contact showing Azerbaijani build-up of manpower and equipment. Opposition MP Sasun Michaelyan accused the defense ministry for spreading false reports, claiming that the build-up statement is false.