Azerbaijan, citing Kosovo precedent, says it is ready to use force to take back Nagorno-Karabakh
Azeri President Ilham Aliyev vowed to be ready to take back by force the breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh, which he says, was emboldened by the Western recognition of Kosovo’s unilateral secession.
(KosovoCompromise Staff) Thursday, March 06, 2008
Fearing the Kosovo domino effect, Azerbaijan's parliament voted to withdraw a 33-strong Azeri peacekeeping team that has been serving there under NATO command since 1999.
Azerbaijan strongly disapproves Kosovo's unilateral secession.
"You see how norms of international law are violated in the world," Aliyev was quoted as saying.
"And this has a negative impact on the settlement of the (Nagorno-Karabakh) conflict. The force factor remains decisive, and we will achieve this (Nagorno-Karabakh's reintegration)."
"We have been buying military machinery, airplanes and ammunition to be ready to liberate the occupied territories, and we are ready to do this," Aliyev said.
He added the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict with neighbouring Armenia could be resolved only on the principle of Azerbaijan's territorial integrity.
Former Soviet Azerbaijan has been trying to restore control over Nagorno-Karabakh, where ethnic Armenian separatists threw off Azeri rule in the 1990s in a war that killed about 35,000 people.
Sixteen people were killed in clashes there this week.
In Washington, the US State Department expressed its concern but repeated the "Kosovo is unique" mantra.
"We're concerned by the outbreak of fighting. We want to see that incident not be repeated," U.S. State Department spokesman Tom Casey told reporters.
"Kosovo is not a precedent and should not be seen as a precedent for any other place out there in the world. It certainly isn't a precedent for Nagorno-Karabakh," he said.
