Azernews.Az

By Sara Rajabova

The Foreign Ministry spokesman has said Azerbaijan is capable of returning its territories occupied by Armenia.

"Azerbaijan is able to return its lands in any way," Elman Abdullayev said in an interview with the Turkish TRT Haber TV channel on Monday. "[But] as we are against human casualties, a political, rather than a military solution, is the priority for Azerbaijan."

Abdullayev added that the main goal of Azerbaijani diplomacy is to change the status quo.

The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict emerged in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. Since a lengthy war in the early 1990s that displaced over one million Azerbaijanis, Armenian armed forces have occupied over 20 percent of Azerbaijan's internationally recognized territory, including Nagorno-Karabakh and seven adjacent regions. The UN Security Council has adopted four resolutions on Armenia's withdrawal from the Azerbaijani territory, but Armenia has not followed them to this day.

Russia, France and the U.S. - co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group - have long been working to broker a solution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, but their efforts have been largely fruitless so far.

Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov earlier said that the next meeting of the Minsk Group co-chairs will take place after the presidential elections in Armenia.

The election took place on February 18.

He also said the mediators had voiced several proposals on the conflict resolution during their last meeting in late January.

Peace negotiations are underway on the basis of a peace outline proposed by the Minsk Group co-chairs and dubbed the Madrid Principles, also known as Basic Principles. The document envisions a return of the territories surrounding Nagorno-Karabakh to Azerbaijani control; determining the final legal status of Nagorno-Karabakh; a corridor linking Armenia to the region; and the right of all internally displaced persons to return home.

Khojaly genocide

Speaking about the Khojaly genocide, the Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry spokesman said that Khojaly was not chosen for perpetrating a massacre of Azerbaijanis by mere chance.

"One of the causes of the tragedy at Khojaly is geo-strategic location of the city and in particular the airport located there," Abdullayev noted.

The ministry spokesman said the massacre was led by those who currently hold and previously held leading positions in Armenia. Incumbent Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan and former President Robert Kocharian are among them.

"They do not even try to hide this fact and repeatedly said and admitted this in their interviews with the media," he said.

Abdullayev stressed that Azerbaijan is trying to bring the truth about the Khojaly massacre to the world community, resulting in the recognition of the events as genocide by the parliaments of several countries.

The town of Khojaly was situated within the administrative borders of the Nagorno Karabakh region of Azerbaijan. Its population constituted over 7,000 people.

Late into the night of February 25, 1992, Khojaly came under intensive fire from the towns of Khankendi and Askeran already occupied by Armenian armed forces. The Armenian forces, supported by the ex-Soviet 366th regiment, completed the surrounding of the town already isolated due to ethnic cleansing of the Azerbaijani population of the neighboring regions. The joint forces occupied the town, which was ruined by heavy artillery shelling.

Thousands of fleeing civilians were ambushed by Armenian forces. Punitive teams of the so-called Nagorno Karabakh defense army reached the unprotected civilians to slaughter them, mutilating and scalping some bodies. 613 people were killed, including 106 women, 70 elderly and 83 children. A total of 1,000 civilians were disabled. Eight families were exterminated, and 25 children lost both parents, while 130 children lost one parent. Moreover, 1,275 innocent people were taken hostage, while the fate of 150 remains unknown.