No new agreements after April 2016 war - Serzh Sargsyan 

ArmInfo. In his interview on January 31, Armenia's third president Serzh Sargsyan refuted the statements about new proposals by the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs  after the war in April 2016.  

Specifically, asked if the Armenian side had to make concessions in  the negotiations over Nagorno- Karabakh's interim or final status in  2016, Mr Sargsyan said he has repeatedly stated that the Armenian  side was never pressured into any concessions.  

In response to Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan's claims about  a radical change in the Nagorno- Karabakh peace process, which could  be described as a disaster, as Nagorno-Karabakh lost all the  opportunities to exist outside Azerbaijan, Mr Sargsyan noted that in  speaking of the April war he did not conceal a commission to  investigate the events was set up. 

"I openly stated a verbal agreement was reached to end the war, and  they claimed a written document could exist or some concessions were  made," he said. 

Asked about a new ceasefire agreement proposed in 2016, Mr Sargsyan  said: "Absolutely not. We were not going to discuss any verbal or  written agreements, and the Minsk Group publicly confirmed that. They  pointed out that no new documents were on the agenda, and the  negotiations continued on the basis of a trilateral ceasefire  agreement of 1994.   

"As regards the document of 2016, you may have noticed he was  speaking of some letters, and so on. But he does not say anything  about what proposals the co-chairs made and when they made them, and  so on.  Yes, after the 2016 war we received proposals from the  co-chairs, and those proposals by no means crossed the redlines we  had always been committed to - Nagorno-Karabakh's self-determination,  land border between Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh, recognition of the  Nagorno-Karabakh authorities by the international community - and  many similar aspects. Sometimes it was called interim status,  sometimes it was called recognized status. And the fourth aspect, a  derivative of the three, security guarantees because, in our view,  independence is the major guarantee, it is your ability to exert  legal influence on all processes - security and so on," Mr Sargsyan  said.  

Under the proposals, the peacekeeping forces were to divide the  conflicting parties.  As to whether the proposals included  confidence-building mechanisms, Mr Sargsyan pointed out that it was  not necessary. Monitoring mechanisms were discussed in the form of  the Vienna and Saint Petersburg statements in 2016, which was to the  advantage of the Armenian side, but was not a solution to the  problem. 

"That was a concrete way of ruling out incidents until a solution was  found. As to the UN Security Council he [Nikol Pashinyan] calls a  disaster, should anyone wishing to discuss the topic get acquainted  with the Kazan document, that one will see that the document - that  declaration - if adopted, would have been subject to approval by the  UN Security Council because it is the UN jurisdiction. The OSCE,  especially the Minsk Group, were not authorized to make such  decisions," Mr Sargsyan said.   

As to whether it means a resolution by the UN Security Council was  discussed before the war in April 2016, Mr Sargsyan said the idea was  enshrined in all the documents, but none of the documents was to be  sent to the UN Security Council. 

"In 2016, we received a package of three different documents. I have  said about it. Among them as an Armenian-Azerbaijani declaration,  statement by the foreign ministers of the co-chairing states, which  would have included some elements unacceptable to Azerbaijan, the  Azerbaijani president did not want to see them in the statement or in  the draft resolution of the UN Security Council, which would have  supplemented the two documents," Mr Sargsyan said. 

According to him, the Armenian premier's statements on the  resolutions by the UN Security Council once more demonstrate he is  not properly informed of either the essence or details of the  negotiations. 

"First, what does the resolution by the UN Security Council of 1993  have to do with it? That resolution deals with an absolutely  different problem. All the resolutions adopted in 1993 dealt with the  ceasefire. It was not the issue of status or any other issue. As to  his claim that the UN Security Council would not have adopted a  resolution, what are his arguments? I say such a resolution would  have been adopted because three of the five permanent members of the  UN Security Council - the USA, Russia and France - proposed it. That  is, imagine three of the five permanent members vote for. Even if one  of the permanent members had vetoed it, what would we have lost? The  co-chairs would have never made a proposal and made a U- turn at the  discussions and approved a different decision. That is impossible,"  Mr Sargsyan said.  As to whether the international community would be  responsible for the unsettled conflict if such events had taken  place, he said that not the international community proper, but an  individual international person would be responsible. 

"But that is impossible. And that was not a disaster. It was not the  most desirable document nor was the Kazan document our dream. But it  was a document acceptable to us, which could have been put into  practice," Mr Sargsyan said. 

The Kazan document provided for an Armenian-Azerbaijani agreement on  a peaceful settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict with an  Artsakh representative's participation. The Kazan document was the  last one approved by the parties, that is, a working document, which  has been the basis for negotiations for the last ten years, Mr  Sargsyan said. 

He said that he is negotiating with thee co-chairs for permission to  publish the document Armenia's premier is abusing. 

As to why he is not publishing the document, as he is not a  negotiator now, Mr Sargsyan said he assumed a number of commitments.  In this context, he offers Armenia's premier to publish the document.   "He is bringing accusations against me. So let him publish the  document. He is the one that has to prove his words are truth. And  then we are going to see who feels ashamed," Mr Sargsyan said.