“According to our assessment, this is Azerbaijan's policy aimed at disrupting the peace process between Armenia and Azerbaijan by all possible means,” Pashinian told a group of visiting British parliamentarians. “This is also evidenced by the aggressive rhetoric of Azerbaijan’s official representatives, spiced with open territorial claims to Armenia.”
“Of course, we should do everything to achieve concrete results in the peace process, and we are doing it,” he said. “But unfortunately, it is not possible to do this without the political will of the other side. And today's incident that claimed the lives of four soldiers testifies not only to the absence of political will for peace but also to Azerbaijan's intentions to deepen the enmity and resort military escalation.”
The soldiers were killed early on Tuesday by heavy fire from Azerbaijani positions across the border between the two states. Azerbaijan said its forces retaliated against the wounding the previous evening of an Azerbaijani serviceman serving in that area. The Armenian military pledged on Monday to investigate the shooting incident reported by the Azerbaijani side.
Armenia’s Foreign Ministry accused Baku on Tuesday afternoon of “looking for pretexts” to heighten tensions on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border. The Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry denied that and insisted that Baku is “committed to the peace process.”
Pashinian claimed the opposite after signaling in recent weeks his readiness to make more concessions to speed up the signing of an Armenian-Azerbaijani peace treaty discussed by the two sides. His political foes and other critics regard his recent calls for the adoption of a new Armenian constitution as one such concession. They say that Pashinian’s appeasement policy will not lead to a lasting peace.