July 14 (EUROPA PRESS) –
Thousands of people have demonstrated this Friday in Nagorno Karabakh to demand the reopening of the Lachin corridor, blocked by Azerbaijan and connecting the territory of the self-proclaimed republic with Armenia, which denounced on Thursday the “illegal blockade” of the route and warned of an “ethnic cleansing”.
The demonstration has taken place in the capital of Artsakh – the official name of the Nagorno Karabakh Republic -, Stepanakert, a protest in which Gurgen Nersisian, a minister of Nagorno Karabakh, has participated, who has indicated that he will meet with the troops of Russian peacekeeping to ask that they help to unblock the route.
“Our next step is to erect tents here and we all hope that our demands are met,” he said, according to the Armenian news agency Armenpress. The Russian troops have not yet ruled on these demands.
“We are here to convey the word of the people of Nagorno-Karabakh to the Russian peacekeeping troops that it is not friendly that Artsakh is under complete blockade while we see helicopters flying every day,” Nersisyan explained.
The Armenian Foreign Ministry stated on Thursday that Baku’s goal is “to create conditions incompatible with life” for the population of Nagorno Karabagh” and accused Azerbaijan of “directly violating the trilateral communiqué of November 2020”, signed after the end of the Second Nagorno Karabagh War.
Armenia and Azerbaijan have also exchanged in recent months numerous accusations of violating the 2020 ceasefire, which ended the Second Nagorno Karabakh War –after that of 1994–. The conflict ended in victory for Azerbaijan, which recovered territories taken by Armenia in the First Nagorno Karabagh War, including the important city of Shusha.
Since then, both countries have maintained various contacts to try to sign a peace agreement, although the talks have encountered various obstacles, including the situation around the Lachín corridor, which connects Armenia with the self-proclaimed republic of Arstaj. The area has the presence of Russian soldiers deployed as peacekeepers under the aforementioned ceasefire agreement.
