Epress.am News from Armenia
The possibility of renewed hostilities between Azerbaijan and Nagorno-Karabakh is very small, Thomas de Waal, an expert on the South Caucasus and senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, said in an interview with ArmRADIO-FM107.
“In July of this year, I travelled to Baku, and their reaction after Kazan was that they don’t want war and they’re spending money on weapons not to fight but to force Armenia to join the arms race and go bankrupt. I think that Azerbaijan is living an illusion,” he said, reports Russian-language news agency Regnum.
According to the analyst, regardless of financial means, Armenia won’t make unilateral concessions. “If you go back 10–15 years ago, Armenia and Azerbaijan were equal. Now Azerbaijan is clearly a richer and stronger country. However, can this be linked with the Karabakh issue? No, I don’t think so, because even if Armenia is poorer and weaker, it will do everything in its power to protect Karabakh. And although I don’t think Armenia has very good social and economic prospects, I also don’t think that Armenia will be forced to cede Karabakh.”
Photo: atamanchik77