Yerevan Rejects Baku’s Opposition to Arms Deal with France
Armenia’s foreign ministry on Wednesday rejected criticism and opposition voiced by Azerbaijan to Yerevan’s deepening military cooperation with France, saying that every sovereign state has a right to have a combat-ready armed forces.
Soon after France’s defense minister announced on Tuesday that Armenia would acquire CAESAR Howitzer anti-missile weapons from a French manufacturer, Azerbaijan’s defense ministry voiced its objections and accused France of derailing the peace process.
The Azerbaijani announcement also overtly threatened retaliation.
“It is the sovereign right of any country to have combat-ready army equipped with modern military equipment,” the Armenian foreign ministry said in its statement.
“The Republic of Armenia recognizes the territorial integrity and inviolability of borders of all its neighbors. Armenia and Azerbaijan have agreed at the highest level that they recognize each other’s territorial integrity and sovereignty based on the 1991 Alma-Ata Declaration. The Republic of Armenia adheres to this principle and has no ambitions beyond its internationally recognized territory of 29,743 square kilometers. The Republic of Armenia has practically proven this approach by demarcating four villages in the Tavush region of the Republic of Armenia and Ghazakh region of the Republic of Azerbaijan,” the statement added.
“Azerbaijan’s practice of predicting regional escalations at every opportunity is thought-provoking and comes to justify the analyzes made by a number of centers that Azerbaijan will do everything to abort the process of concluding a peace agreement with Armenia, in order to undertake new aggression against the Republic of Armenia after the COP29 summit in Baku in November 2024,” the foreign ministry emphasized.
“It draw the international community’s attention to this, as well as to the fact that official Yerevan’s proposal to conclude a peace agreement within one month remained without response by official Baku,” the foreign ministry added.
