Secretary General of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) Stanislav Zas has commented on the recent illegal incursion of the Azerbaijani armed forces into Armenia’s sovereign territory.
The CSTO chief told reporters that the escalation of the border situation in Armenia’s south is not under the provisions of the CSTO Charter.
“We need to understand that the CSTO potential is applied only in case of aggression, attack. Here, we, in fact, deal with a border incident. Thanks God, there are no casualties, no fires. This is a border incident, it must be solved, and we support the peaceful solution of the issue”, he said.
According to him, there is no escalation of the conflict and there is no need to talk about escalation of the situation now.
“There is still a lot to do for solving the border issues, disputable moments, but they must be solved around negotiation table”, he said.
The CSTO Secretary General informed that after Armenia’s appeal the Organization has conducted consultations over the situation in the country’s border regions.
“Such consultations were held with the defense ministers, the secretaries of security councils, and I have talked to both the Armenian foreign minister and defense minister. We were discussing this situation. In addition, we had a general discussion also during the CSTO foreign ministers council session in Dushanbe”, Stanislav Zas said.
He assured that the CSTO will always follow the situation in Armenia’s south.
“No decision was made over the formation of a monitoring group, although we, of course, follow the situation”, he said, adding that the CSTO receives necessary information from numerous sources, including from the Armenian side and the Russian peacekeepers.
