Azernews.Az

BAKU – Azerbaijan paraded thousands of soldiers and hundreds of military vehicles through its capital on Sunday, in a show of force two days after talks failed to resolve a bitter territorial dispute with Armenia.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, who has overseen massive increases in defense spending, warned in his speech that he was ready to take back the occupied Nagorno Karabakh region, which was seized from Azerbaijan in the 1990s by Armenian separatist forces backed by Yerevan.

"The war is not over yet," Aliyev said at the showpiece parade in the center of Baku, vowing to end the occupation of Karabakh.

"The territorial integrity of Azerbaijan must be restored and the territory will be restored," he said, according to AFP.

Six thousand troops marched in the parade, accompanied by tanks, armored cars and rocket launchers, as fighter planes and combat helicopters roared overhead and warships lined up in the nearby Caspian Sea bay.

In his speech, Aliyev also spoke approvingly about the increases in defense spending financed by the energy-rich state's huge revenues from oil and gas exports.

"Azerbaijan has fulfilled the task that I set, which was that Azerbaijan's military expenditure must exceed the entire state budget of Armenia," he said, noting that defense spending reached $3.3 billion this year.

"The international community is worried by our policy in this area and places the emphasis on this," Aliyev said.

"But Azerbaijan continues to live in a state of war and is trying to resolve the Karabakh issue," he said. "We are continuing negotiations with Armenia, but they have been underway for a very long time and the people are tired of them. They cannot go on for ever."

Military hardware manufactured in Azerbaijan, including unmanned drones produced jointly with an Israeli company, was on show for the first time to highlight the country's expanding defense industry.

Particularly remarkable was the display at the parade of missile defense systems. Vehicles with mounted S-125 Pechora, S-300 and, for the first time, S-300 PMU Favorite anti-aircraft missile systems rolled through the area.

Also, Cobra armored vehicles, purchased by the Azerbaijani defense ministry from Turkey, were shown at the parade for the first time.

Along with howitzers of various calibers, BM-21 Grad rocket launchers, Israel-made Lar drum-fire systems, Ukraine-made Smerch long-range missiles, as well as Russian Tochka-U missiles were shown to the public.

The parade also displayed combat vehicles of Azerbaijan’s ground troops. For the first time, Matador and Marauder mine protected vehicles supplied with Istiglal sniper rifles, which were manufactured by Azerbaijan’s ministry of defense industry jointly with South Africa’s Paramount Group, drove through the square.

The parade in Baku was the third in the country's post-Soviet history and also marked this year's 20th anniversary of independence.

It was shown live on state television in a broadcast preceded by a series of patriotic songs accompanied by images of troops in action and President Aliyev wearing camouflage fatigues.

The parade was held after the leaders of Azerbaijan and Armenia failed to agree despite strong international pressure to a roadmap document that would have been a significant step towards a Karabakh peace deal.

The two enemies traded accusations after the summit in Russia last Friday, with Armenia saying that Azerbaijan had torpedoed the talks by wanting a dozen changes to the document and Baku saying that Yerevan was seeking to mislead the world.

The outcome was a major disappointment after hopes had been raised of a long-awaited breakthrough in the talks, which were presided over by Russian President Dmitry Medvedev in the city of Kazan.

The interim basic principles agreement would see an Armenian withdrawal from the regions around Nagorno Karabakh that were also seized during the post-Soviet war. It also envisages international security guarantees and a vote on the final status of the territory at some point in the future.