Azernews.Az

BAKU – NGO representatives from the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) who have visited Khankandi, the center of the self-proclaimed republic run by ethnic Armenians in Azerbaijan’s Nagorno Karabakh region, have claimed that Baku was aware of their visit. The statement came after Baku strongly condemned the unauthorized visit.

Kutluay Erkin, former head of Lefkosa municipality who chairs an opposition party, has told the Baku-based ANS TV channel that Britain’s International Alert organization, which organized the visit, had informed Azerbaijan’s Foreign Ministry and other government agencies about it. According to Erkin, representatives of both the ministry and Presidential Administration had been notified to that end in writing and provided their consent.

"The Azerbaijani side was to be informed and had to indirectly give its permission [for the visit]. Otherwise, we would not have gone [to Nagorno Karabakh]," Erkin said.

The NGO representatives attended a roundtable held in Khankandi on April 1-3, which studied Cyprus as an example of an armed conflict followed by peace-keeping efforts and a peaceful co-existence of residents.

The TRNC’s Baku office has said it was unaware of the NGO representatives’ visit. It said that further to the meeting organized last month in Baku by Western NGOs, another meeting took place in Armenia, and it appears that participants, under the pretext of "a contribution to peace", were taken to Khankandi from there. The TRNC said it "does not welcome" and is "upset" over the visit.

Azerbaijan’s Foreign Ministry has said those persons were "blacklisted" and barred from coming to Azerbaijan.

Nagorno Karabakh has been occupied by Armenian forces since a 1994 cease-fire ended a war that killed an estimated 30,000 people and ousted up to one million Azerbaijanis from their homes. Years of OSCE-brokered peace talks have brought few tangible results.