YEREVAN (RFE/RL)–President Serzh Sarkisian should have participated in the recent NATO summit in Lisbon, even if he had reason to boycott it, Germany’s ambassador to Armenia said on Wednesday.
Sarkisian made the decision in protest against the alliance’s support for Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity that was voiced in a declaration adopted at the summit. He argued that the NATO document does not refer to two other principles of international law — people’s self-determination and non-use of force — favored by international mediators seeking to end the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.
Two of the mediating powers, the United States and France, are key NATO members. The peace proposals on Karabakh put forward by them and Russia are based on the three principles cited by Sarkisian.
“I think that participation in the Lisbon summit would have been more correct. It would have allowed [Armenia] to present its position,” said Ambassador Hans-Jochen Schmidt.
“But I fully understand Armenia’s position that emphasizes the need for a simultaneous and joint application of those three principles,” he told a news conference. “I also think it right … to express a clear position, which is what happened in this case.”
Schmidt revealed that ahead of the November 20-21 summit Yerevan asked the German government to present its position to the heads of NATO members states and governments who gathered in the Portuguese capital. He noted that Germany tends to be more sympathetic towards self-determination, championed by the Armenian side, than territorial integrity.
Sarkisian’s boycott does not seem to have halted Armenia’s deepening cooperation with NATO. The Armenian government announced last week plans to increase the number of Armenian troops serving in Afghanistan under German command.
Schmidt said Berlin, which provides those troops with weapons and ammunition, has yet to decide whether to agree to the additional Armenian deployment. Armenian and German officials are currently discussing the matter, he said.
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And Germany should not forget that the Armenian Genocide was materialized with their assistance to Turkey in monetary fund, military training and military armament.
What did Germany and NATO do to protect 200,000+ Serbian civilians to be cleansed out of their homeland (and killed) within a 4-day attack by the Croatian Army nazis? They armed Croatians with the tanks from East Germany’s army and they trained Croatians and helped them to plan the operation while Turkish Army trained Bosnian Muslim units. This is the scenario Azerbaijani sultan Ilham Aliyev is hoping for Artsakh. Check out who has the contract to equip and train Azeri snipers who kill Artsakh Armenians almost daily.
Dear Ambassador:
Germany should do more and support the right of Arstakh (NKR) for re-unification with Armenia or independent!
Starting form 1955 Germany has made twice use of the right of people for self-determination
1- Saarland joined to Germany ( the situation of NKR has some similarities with Saarland – this is the wish of people to be unitied with “motherland” – In 1955 the inhabitants were offered independence in a plebiscite, but instead voted to become a state of West Germany.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saarland
2- Reunification of West and East Germany- the first border changes in new Europe after the end of WW II and cold war
The former German Foreign Minster Hans-Dietrich Genscher with his foreign policy doctrine did contribute to the border changes in Balkan. I wouldnßt be wrong to claim, that policy pursued by H.D Genscher was designed (driven force) to put an end to former Yugoslavia. How comes that all of sudden Germany is refusing to recognize NKR or has problems to accept the choice and wish of Karbakhi people to be free of Turkish yoke?