Azernews.Az

BAKU – Azerbaijan will not hit civilian targets, unlike Armenia, which is known for its terror operations and warfare against Azerbaijani civilians, the Foreign Ministry spokesman has said.

Elkhan Polukhov was commenting on the uproar caused by Yerevan over Baku’s repeated warnings regarding the potential consequences of the planned reopening of an airport in the Armenia-occupied Nagorno Karabakh region. The two South Caucasus republics fought a lengthy war over the mountainous region in the early 1990s that had flared up due to Armenia’s territorial claims.

The separatist authorities have been rebuilding the airport near Khankandi, the center of the self-proclaimed republic run by ethnic Armenians in Nagorno Karabakh, and plan to reopen it on May 9 to restart commercial flights to Yerevan. Baku said earlier that it has told the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) that the occupied territories' airspace was a no-fly zone and any flights would be unauthorized. Arif Mammadov, the director of Azerbaijan's Civil Aviation Administration, told the press that according to the law on aviation, it is possible to shoot down airplanes violating Azerbaijan's airspace.

Armenia’s civil aviation agency on Thursday confirmed that the country had received a letter from ICAO stressing Azerbaijan’s concern over the planned operation of the airport.

Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan said he will be the first passenger on board a plane flying to the airport in Khankandi.

The airport has been closed since the outbreak of the Karabakh war, which saw ethnic Armenian forces backed by Yerevan occupy the region amid fighting that left an estimated 30,000 people dead. Azerbaijan has repeatedly warned it could use force to regain its occupied territories if the ongoing peace talks remain fruitless.

The Azerbaijani ministry’s spokesman Polukhov expressed his astonishment over the uproar raised by Armenia over the issue.

"There is a wrong impression as if it is not the Armenian side, but Azerbaijan that is known for its [military] action against civil facilities which has killed hundreds and thousands of peaceful residents. Needless to say that there were tens of terror acts staged in [Azerbaijan’s] civil transportation system – on buses, in the subway, railways, helicopters that were shot down above the occupied territories, and an Iranian plane with civilians on board. Moreover, there were deliberate actions that had caused the crash on December 11, 1988 of a plane carrying 78 Azerbaijani volunteers who were heading to help those affected by the earthquake in Spitak."

"All this was done at the hands of not the Azerbaijani side, but Armenia, which is leaning on the experience of its militants gained during the period of terrorist activity against airports, airplanes and civilian facilities both in Europe and the whole world throughout the 20th century," Polukhov said.

The ministry spokesman reminded the world community that any flights to the occupied Azerbaijani territories would be illegal and dangerous, but noted that the threat was being caused by the Armenians themselves.

In November 1991, the Armenian forces shot down a military helicopter near a village of Azerbaijan’s Khojavand region, killing 19 people, including Azerbaijani officials as well as observers from Russia and Kazakhstan.

In another such incident, the Armenian troops shot down a Mi-8 civilian helicopter near the Azerbaijani town of Shusha located in Nagorno Karabakh in January 1992. 44 people on board, mostly women and children, were killed.

In March 1994, the Armenian forces shot down Iran’s Hercules plane with a missile above Khankandi, killing 34 Iranian diplomats and their family members.