Azerbaijan Does Not Release Prisoners because It Wants to Halt the Reinforcement of the Artsakh Army, Says Robert Kocharian

This is yet another disgrace we face today. This was stated by the second President of Armenia, Robert Kocharian, in an interview with representatives from three media outlets—Angela Tovmasyan (hayeli.am), Sevak Hakobyan (Yerevan-today), and Boris Murazi (politik.am)—when addressing the issue of military prisoners.

“I am convinced that without resolving the issue of prisoners, we should have no contact whatsoever. This should be a prerequisite for taking any other steps. There is a hundredfold 'why' about why these steps are not being taken, the answer to which we do not have. In popular terms, we have a government that has had all its teeth extracted; there is no bite. Now, what does state secret mean? Another question arises—who is it secret from? Maybe Azerbaijan does not know how many prisoners it has? From our people? In general, state secrets are considered the information, the numbers that our enemies need from a national security standpoint. Right now, that number is known to our enemy better than we do. Who are you hiding it from? The concept of state secret has been completely turned upside down.

This is the issue around which we can garner support from everyone. If we are principled, no one can tell us why we are doing this. It is a principled issue; these people need to be returned. A trilateral meeting, or generally such meetings, are prepared in advance. Let that trilateral meeting be three days late, one week late, or one month late. Before that trilateral meeting or during that meeting, the issue of prisoners should have been resolved. These people are so beaten down that they cannot speak; they cannot fight for the prisoners, for our national and state interests. And they cannot fight. Psychologically, they are not in that status right now. Now they will be begging, either to give them the prisoners, or else the revanchist forces will come… They might even use my factor, saying, ‘Give the prisoners so that Kocharian does not talk about this.’ We have ended up in a situation worse than trash. If our people tolerate this, then we deserve this situation.

Why is Azerbaijan not handing over the prisoners? It wants to halt the reinforcement of the Artsakh army. They say that anyone who has found themselves there since November 9 cannot have the status of a war prisoner. Why do they say this? Holding onto prisoners is an ungrateful task. I was the president of Artsakh; we had many prisoners. We returned them through the Red Cross because when you hold a prisoner, you are under constant pressure. I am convinced that Aliyev is under constant pressure regarding the prisoners. He holds onto them for a very specific purpose; he is using that tool to undermine the remnants of the Artsakh state system. After handing over the prisoners, they will take more, until reassurance is received that no soldiers from Armenia will be sent to Artsakh. That will be the price, and our government will agree to it because they are being led around by the nose,” noted Robert Kocharian.