Lavrov accuses Turkey of escalating the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh
Russia criticized Turkish authorities for their “absolutely unacceptable” comments during the violence in Nagorno-Karabakh between the separatists supported by Armenia and the Azerbaijani forces.
“These were calls not for peace but for war,” the Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergey Lavrov stated on April 2nd after negotiations with his Armenian colleague, Edward Nalbandian, in Yerevan.
The four-day outbreak of violence resulted in ceasefire agreements but sporadic firing is still on-going.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan stated during the escalation in conflict that Turkey “is side by side with its brothers in Azerbaijan.”
“Someday Karabakh will return to its original owner. It will be Azerbaijan,” Erdoğan then noted. Then the Turkish President also accused Russia of involvement in the conflict on the Armenian side.
Relations between Turkey and Russia worsened after Ankara shot down a Russian military aircraft near the Syrian border in November 2015.
The de facto independent and unrecognized Nagorno-Karabakh Republic was established on the basis of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast of the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic and has been controlled by ethnic Armenians since a war over the disputed territory ended in 1994.