The French government condemned Azerbaijan’s September 19-20 military offensive in Nagorno-Karabakh that paved the way for the restoration of Azerbaijani control over the region and displaced its virtually entire ethnic Armenian population. President Emmanuel Macron suggested last week that Baku might now attack Armenia as well.
“The president of the republic said it: the integrity, sovereignty, protection of the Armenian population are an absolute objective for us,” Lecornu told the France Info broadcaster in a weekend interview.
“Could France intervene militarily?” he said. “I do not think so. It is up to the president of the republic and head of the armed forces, obviously, to answer this question.”
Lecornu did not rule out arms supplies or other military aid to Armenia. The minister noted that France opened recently a “defense mission” in the South Caucasus state which is looking into “their needs, particularly in terms of defense and protection.” He did not go into details.
Macron’s government signaled the possibility of arms supplies when it sent a delegation of French defense officials to Yerevan in October 2022. They met with Defense Minister Suren Papikian, Armenian army chief Eduard Asrian and High-Technology Minister Robert Khachatrian.
Papikian visited Paris in September 2022 and June this year. He met with Lecornu on both occasions. Visiting Yerevan in July, the French Senate speaker, Gerard Larcher, called for the “acceleration of the delivery of defensive weapons by France to Armenia.”
Armenian parliament speaker Alen Simonian described France as a “real ally of Armenia and the Armenian people” when he met with the speaker of the lower house of the French parliament, Yael Braun-Pivet, in Dublin last Thursday. According to his press office, Simonian also “expressed confidence about the continuation of France's efforts to ensure Armenia's security.”
Azerbaijan has repeatedly accused Macron and other French officials of siding with Armenia in the Karabakh conflict. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev charged on July 3 that Paris is fomenting “Armenian separatism” in Karabakh. Yerevan rejected the Azerbaijani criticism.
France is home to a sizable and influential Armenian community mostly consisting of descendants of survivors of the 1915 Armenian genocide in Ottoman Turkey.