Azernews.Az

Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan must understand that the crimes against humanity will not go unpunished, Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry spokesman Elman Abdullayev has said, referring to the atrocities committed during the brutal war fought by the two countries in the early 1990s.

"The individuals who committed those acts will be brought before an international court of law," Abdullayev said at a briefing on Wednesday. "President Sargsyan's visit to the territories occupied by Armenia is a violation of all international rights."

Sargsyan visited the occupied Nagorno-Karabakh region on Monday.

The conflict between the two South Caucasus countries emerged in 1988 when Armenia leveled territorial claims against Azerbaijan. Since the 1990s war, which claimed some 30,000 lives and displaced about a million Azerbaijanis, Armenian armed forces have occupied over 20 percent of Azerbaijan's internationally recognized territory, including Nagorno Karabakh, defying UN resolutions.

A fragile ceasefire has been in place in the region since 1994. The co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group -- Russia, France and the U.S. -- are brokering peace talks. The negotiations have been largely fruitless so far.