Leaving today’s closed-door meeting of Armenia’s ad-hoc parliamentary committee looking into the events of the April 2016 Artsakh “Four Day War”, former Armed Forces Intelligence Department Head Arshak Karapetyan told waiting reporters that he could not answer any of their questions due to state security concerns.

"Since all the questions about me are a bit secretive, I'm sorry, but it’s not that I don't want to communicate with you, I just can't," Karapetyan told reporters at the end of the meeting.

Today was the second time that Karapetyan had been summoned to appear before the commission.

When asked why he had been summoned for a second time, Karapetyan said, “They had questions to clarify. They asked them and I replied yet again.”

As to whether there were contradictions in his answers and those given by former Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan, Karapetyan said he did not know what Sargsyan had said.

Sargsyan, who served as Armenian president when fighting broke out along the Artsakh-Azerbaijan border in the summer of 2016, testified before the parliamentary ad hoc committee on April 16.

Committee Chair Andranik Kocharyan told reporters that Karapetyan’s second appearance was quite useful.

The committee has also questioned former Artsakh Defense Army Commander Levon Mnatsakanyan.

When asked if the committee has, based on the testimonies of Mnatsakanyan, Karapetyan and others, concluded that there were intelligence gaps in predicting the Azerbaijani attack, Kocharyan replied that having proper intelligence cannot forecast all such developments.

“Intelligence can’t do everything. One day, our country will such an intelligence apparatus, like the U.S. CIA, that can avert such escapades. One of the problems to be solved is to give our intelligence the means to foresee such threats as soon as possible in the future,” Kocharyan said.

The parliament will publicize its findings in its upcoming autumn session.

Kocharyan said that former Armenian Minister of Foreign Affairs has agreed to testify before the committee.