Posted on 03/04/2008 10:53:37 AM PST by Tailgunner Joe
BAKU, March 4 (Reuters) - Azerbaijan's president said on Tuesday his country was ready to take back breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh by force if need be and was buying military equipment and arms in preparation.
President Ilham Aliyev linked his comments to the newly-declared independence in Kosovo which he said had emboldened ethnic Armenian separatists in Nagorno-Karabakh.
In a sign of disapproval of Kosovo's independence Azerbaijan's parliament later voted to withdraw a 33-strong Azeri peacekeeping team that has been serving there under NATO command since 1999.
Former Soviet Azerbaijan has been trying to restore control over Nagorno-Karabakh, where ethnic Armenian separatists threw off Azeri rule in the 1990s in a war that killed about 35,000 people.
"We have been buying military machinery, airplanes and ammunition to be ready to liberate the occupied territories, and we are ready to do this," Turan quoted Aliyev as saying.
He added the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict with neighbouring Armenia could be resolved only on the principle of Azerbaijan's territorial integrity.
The fragile peace between Azerbaijan and Armenia has held thanks to a ceasefire announced in May 1994 whan large-scale hostilities ended.
But as Aliyev spoke, local television channels reported that two Azeri soldiers died in an exchange of fire near Nagorno-Karabakh's border earlier on Tuesday.
Armenian Prime Minister Serzh Sarksyan, who will become the next president after winning a Feb. 19 election, blamed Azeri soldiers for attacking Armenian forces but said he hoped for a peaceful solution to the stand-off.
"I'm full of hope that normal and civilised logic will prevail in the end," he told reporters in the Armenian capital.
"The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict will be solved by peaceful means and I rule out a military solution to this conflict."
"ILLEGAL" PRECEDENT
After mainly ethnic Albanian Kosovo declared independence from Serbia last month, Nagorno-Karabakh said this would help its own drive for international recognition.
The United States, major European Union powers and Azerbaijan's close ally Turkey have all backed Kosovo's independence, but Baku views it as illegal.
"You see how norms of international law are violated in the world," Aliyev was quoted as saying.
"And this has a negative impact on the settlement of the (Nagorno-Karabakh) conflict. The force factor remains decisive, and we will achieve this (Nagorno-Karabakh's reintegration)."
An Azeri official acknowledged that the pull-out of peacekeepers had clear political overtones due "to the changed political situation" after Kosovo's independence.
Azerbaijan's economy, propelled by windfall revenues from booming Caspian Sea oil exports, has shown double-digit growth, and Aliyev said the nation's $1.3 billion military budget was set to expand further in the years to come.
Aliyev said he believed Azerbaijan's growing military could nudge talks towards a diplomatic breakthrough. "A time will come when the Armenians will agree to that (settlement)," he said.
Yeah, the great diplomacy of the Sink Emperor. Left the region in a mess and when it erupts again, the MSM will blame Bush.
By the way, did those troops get home by Christmas last year, or what Christmas did the Rapist have in mind ???
They are Christians trying to get free from Muslims.
So there will be no outcry.
Here, like Kosovo, is another conflict where the U.S. favors the Islamic radicals over the Christians. It has something to do with the path for a Halliburton oil pipeline construction project.
ping
Yawn.
Thanks for the Code Pink/MoveOn.org/DailyKos/International A.N.S.W.E.R. propaganda.
How do you figure that? Kosovo independence was opposed by the muslims in this case and advances the cause of the Christian Armenians. Armenia is on NATO’s side and has peacekeepers in Kosovo. Muslim Azerbaijan is on Russia and Serbia’s side in this case and has pulled its troops out of Kosovo.
The muzzies in Azerbaijan oppose the Kosovo independence because it fuels the call for independence in Christian/Jewish Nagorno-Karabakh.
For all the propaganda about muslims supporting Kosovo, as it turns out only 3 muslim countries have recognized their independence. Most of the muslim countries in the world have sided with Russia.
Right. So in this case we are on the side of the Christians and the muslims are against us. Just the opposite of what you said.
Are you saying the U.S. backs the breakaway of Christian Nagorno-Karabakh? Where are you getting your news?
NATO has demanded Russian withdrawal from Transnistria, Abkhazia and South Ossetia, but not Nagorno-Karabakh.
He has stated that there should be a peaceful settlement to the differences between Armenia and Azerbaijan over N-K.
This is also a situation that Armenia has exacerbated.
Perhaps that’s because they a good chance of Armenia eventually becoming part of NATO.
Additionally the war between Armenians and Azeris left approximately 800,000 Azeris and 400,000 Armenians ethnically cleansed (according to Wikipedia), which is greater than what happened temporarily during the Kosovo war.
The outflow of Albanians happened only after NATO attacks and during the most intense phase of the fighting and the Albanians returned after the NATO bombs stopped.
So when it comes to long-standing genuine ethnic cleansing (where people still can't return to their homes years after the skirmishes) Armenia and Azerbaijan far outdo Kosovo. Yet given the comparative media attention it's as if nothing much happened between them.
This only shows how heavy, persistent media attention combined with heavy U.S./NATO meddling make a situation exist in the minds of the western public while other similar or worse situations are practically non-existent to those same minds.
“Goble-2” suggested exchanging the southern part of Armenia (the Region of Megri) with the western part of Nakhichevan autonomy, where it has a 9-km border with Turkey. At the same time Nagorno-Karabakh, together with the Lachin Corridor become a part of Armenia, or get independence; the blockade of the Armenia-Turkish border is abolished, the problem of non-enclave existence of Nakhichev Autonomy of Azerbaijan is solved, the border between Armenia and Iran are preserved, and is only moved to north, which has a key geopolitical significance: in this case when being passed to Armenia, the part of Nakhichevan Autonomy doesn’t allow any joining with Turkey and Azerbaijan. - LINKOf course the current president of Armenia is from Nagorno-Karabakh and apparently opposes any land swap.
So what?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.