Mirzoyan: Armenia offered its assistance to Azerbaijan in deciphering  maps of minefields

ArmInfo.The Republic of Armenia unilaterally handed over to Azerbaijan all maps of minefields in its possession, despite the absence of such an obligation both in  the framework of tripartite statements and in the framework of  international law. Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan stated  this in an interview with Armenpress, referring to Baku's groundless  accusations relating to the location of the mines.

He also recalled that Yerevan expressed its readiness to cooperate  with international partners to help decipher the transferred maps.

"At the same time, I consider it necessary to emphasize that mines in  Nagorno-Karabakh and neighboring regions were planted during the  First Karabakh War, and this was mainly carried out by Azerbaijan,  which controlled these regions during the first war. The calls of the  Armenian side for cooperation remained unanswered, moreover,  Azerbaijan in every possible way created obstacles to the  implementation of demining work. In 2017, as a result of manipulating  the issue of providing assistance to Armenia in this area, Azerbaijan  even blocked the activities of the OSCE Yerevan office," Mirzoyan  said.

According to him, the report of the International Committee of the  Red Cross for 2019 recorded that during their mission, 747 people  became victims of mines in Nagorno-Karabakh, 59% of whom were  civilians, and this is in the case when the authorities of  Nagorno-Karabakh began to count the number victims from mine  explosions only since 2004.

"Regarding Azerbaijan's publications that the Armenian side has  deployed Armenian-made mines in Nagorno-Karabakh, I must record that  the Azerbaijani side found the presented mines not in Nagorno-  Karabakh, but in the sovereign territories of the Republic of Armenia  occupied by Azerbaijan in 2021- 2022, they are currently trying to  use these mines for propaganda purposes.

We do not deny that the Armenian Armed Forces are carrying out mining  work on the sovereign territory of Armenia and this is due to the  constantly high risk of new military aggressions from Azerbaijan,  which we witnessed in May and November 2021, as well as in September  2022," the Head of the MFA of Armenia added.

He recalled that during this period, Azerbaijan also carried out  similar aggressive actions in Nagorno- Karabakh, especially in  February and August of this year, thereby proving that the population  of Nagorno- Karabakh needs self-defense forces in order not to be  subjected to ethnic cleansing.

" As for the Azerbaijani accusations that the units of the Armenian  armed forces continue to be deployed in Nagorno-Karabakh, then this  also does not correspond to reality in any way. In order to verify  the authenticity of our claim, Prime Minister Pashinyan even offered  to send an international fact-finding mission to Nagorno-Karabakh,  which was rejected by Azerbaijani President Aliyev," Mirzoyan  concluded.

It should be noted that earlier Azerbaijani propaganda, in order to  justify the aggression of the Azerbaijani Armed Forces against the  sovereign territories of Armenia and the civilian population of  Artsakh, began to disseminate information that allegedly Russian  peacekeepers were transferring weapons and anti-personnel mines to  the NKR. This information was refuted by both the Russian and  Armenian sides. According to experts, with these actions, the enemy  is preparing the ground for new aggression.