Armenian PM Nikol Pashinyan, during a speech in the National Assembly on April 13, said that the “the international community is again telling us to lower our benchmark on the status of Nagorno Karabakh a little.”

In response, Hetq wrote to Pashinyan’s office asking it to clarify what Pashinyan meant by the term “international community’. Did he mean the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs?

We also asked what that “status” was that needed to be lessened.  

Pashinyan added that the international community warned that if Armenia didn’t lower its demands on the status of Karabakh it shouldn’t rely on the international community for help.

Hetq also asked for clarification on this as well. What “help” was the international community referring to?

Pashinyan, in his speech, also said, “I am guilty of not saying clearly and unequivocally that even the scenarios unacceptable to us were not accepted by Azerbaijan and the representatives of the international community sometimes told us clearly, sometimes diplomatically, that if all this is accepted by the Armenian side, Azerbaijan still has to be convinced to accept it.”

Hetq asked what scenarios or proposals Pashinyan was referring to.

We also inquired about the following passage in Pashinyan’s speech.

“Today the international community clearly tells us that being the only country in the world that does not recognize the territorial integrity of Turkey's ally Azerbaijan is a great danger not only for Artsakh but also for Armenia.”

We asked Pashinyan’s office whether such signals were transmitted to Armenia by Russia and whether this means that in case of non-recognition of Azerbaijan's territorial integrity CSTO will renounce its defense obligations to Armenia.

 Pashinyan, in his speech, also noted that an agreement was reached on April 6 on the formation of bilateral commissions on demarcation issues by the end of this month. However, an agreement was reached in Sochi on November 26 last year that these commissions should be formed by the end of 2021.

Hetq asked why these commissions hadn’t been formed in 2021.

Finally, Pashinyan said that Armenian government officials are working with the Azerbaijani side to reach an understanding on organizing the bilateral border commission agreed to on April 6.

Hetq asked if the Armenian government is in direct contact with Baku on the matter or if the talks are via a third party.

Pashinyan’s office responded to Hetq's inquiry with the following one sentence.

"We have nothing to add to the statements made in Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan's speech."