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The Washington Times issues article on Armenian-Azerbaijani Nagorno-Karabakh conflict
The Washington Times has published an article headlined “U.S. support for Ukraine but not for Azerbaijan?”.
Written by Maayan Jaffe, the article says: “The United States must be consistent in its treatment of post-Soviet separatist conflicts. These past months, the White House and Congress have rightly supported Ukraine. But why is America not doing the same for its ally in the Caucasus region, for Azerbaijan? Where is the consistency necessary for a sustainable and successful U.S. foreign policy? For more than 20 years, Armenia has waged an ongoing, illegal occupation and ethnic cleansing in Nagorno-Karabakh and seven other adjacent regions of Azerbaijan — in violation of its sovereignty and territorial integrity.
Nagorno-Karabakh and these other districts have historically belonged to Azerbaijan and have been recognized as belonging to Azerbaijan by the international community. Yet, they have remained under Armenian occupation for more than two decades, since 1992. Then, following a violent and bloody conflict, Armenia occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan (including the noted areas) and plunged the south Caucasus region into an ever-lingering conflict.
The occupation of a country’s internationally recognized lands by another country should be unacceptable, period.
International law clearly supports Azerbaijan’s position. Therefore, the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict should be settled in accordance with the existing United Nations resolutions on the conflict and should be solved unequivocally.
The United States must stand up not just for Ukraine, but the broad principle of territorial integrity and sovereignty. The U.S. must be consistent in their assessment of conflicts in Ukraine, Georgia and Azerbaijan. Belatedly, many now admit that had we been more consistent vis-a-vis conflicts between Armenia and Azerbaijan, and in Georgia early on, the tragic events in Ukraine could have been avoided.
The risk of inconsistency is not solely to our allies, but to the principles of freedom and respect for international law as well as basic regional stability in general.”
Maayan Jaffe is a former editor-in-chief of the Baltimore Jewish Times and a regularly contributing writer to JNS.org.