The former minister of foreign affairs of Karabakh Arman Melikyan is sure that if the Armenian side acts passively on the line then it is not excluded that the Azerbaijani pressure will increase. When speaking of the attack of the Azerbaijani diversion group Melikyan mentioned that the Armenian side also has its guilt but the extenuating circumstance is that there was a difference between the diversion group and the soldiers. “It is another issue that the commanders should have taken into account that this kind of incidents are predictable and they were supposed to be more prepared for that. We should seriously analyze why the Azerbaijanis had attacked from that region. Did they know that the Armenian positions were weak on that line?” mentioned Melikyan by adding that the authorities of Armenia should bring up new outlines regarding the NKR conflict. Former Foreign Minister of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic Arman Melikyan doesn’t have big expectations from the US State Secretary Hillary Clinton’s Armenia visit. He more signifies the previous developments, i.e. Saint Petersburg meeting, joint statement of the Presidents of the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairing states. According to him, the situation in the region is a deadlock and the co-chairing countries just try to preserve this deadlock until the sides in conflict find a way out. “The recent presidential statement marked the end of another stage of Karabakh talks,” he said. “Presently, the superpowers can nothing but keep the process in deadlock.” According to Melikyan, things can get moving only thanks to initiatives of the conflicting parties. A. Melikyan said Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh Republic should assume new positions and undertake new initiatives. In terms of this, according to him, the State Secretary’s visit is of informative nature as to what the stance of the sides is and what further steps are to come following the statement of the three Presidents. “Unfortunately not much depends on the NKR because the political outline is determined in Yerevan. The NKR very much wants to participate in the negotiation process but nobody allows them to do so,” he said. Melikyan dwelt on the Armenian and Turkish process as well. According to him, football diplomacy is to be repeated once every four year just like the football world cup. Seriously, Arman Melikyan thinks it “successfully died” and Turkey tries to appear in front of the international community with new initiatives. According to Melikyan the Armenian side should be more careful on the borderline because the number of such provocation cases may grow. “In the future Turkey will be more engaged in such actions and we should be ready to give an adequate response to that,” said Melikyan.
