Military actions in Karabakh broke out after Turkish guests' visit

Semyon Bagdasarov,  Head of the Center for Middle East and Central Asia Studies, sees a  Turkish trace in escalation of the Karabakh conflict.  

"Almost all high-ranking officials of Turkey have visited Baku over  the past few months. Erdogan was also going to pay a visit to Baku,  but did not - because of the terror attacks. Hopefully, this will not  develop into a large-scale war, though the danger cannot be ruled out  completely," the expert says. He thinks that Turks can also take part  in the conflict but they will be unable to cope with the self-defense  army of Karabakh.  

Several experts also think that the new surge of hostilities in  Karabakh is Erdogan's attempt to take vengeance on Putin for the  sanctions imposed on Turkey and for Syria. 

Karabakh has faced a no peace no war situation for nearly 30 years,  infotop.lv says, adding that in the late 1980s the residents of the  Armenian-populated Nagorno Karabakh Autonomous Oblast (NKAO)  announced their intention to withdraw from the Azerbaijani SSR.  

The peace talks under the OSCE Minsk Group's auspices have been held  since 1992. Azerbaijan insists on returning Karabakh to Azerbaijan  and Armenia defends the interests of the unrecognized republic, which  found itself in Azerbaijan's structure due to Stalin's voluntaristic  decision. The same happened to Nakhijevan Autonomous Republic, from  which all Armenians were driven off during the Soviet years and all  the ancient Armenian churches and monasteries were destroyed. The  residents of Karabakh do not want to share the fate of Nakhijevan  residents and they heroically fight for their own land, the source  says.