US analyst: Meaningless for Yerevan to deny existence of minefield maps

“Despite that some analysts doubted the existence of maps of the mined fields and even assumed that the Armenian military, out of sheer incompetence, couldn’t remember the locations of all the planted mines. In fact, there is evidence of the planned and organized nature of the operation to mine the Azerbaijani territories,” US journalist, national security analyst, and lawyer Irina Tsukerman told Report.

She was commenting on Armenia’s transferring a map of minefields in the liberated Aghdam district of Azerbaijan.

She noted that the leadership of Armenia gave the order to mine the territories in Karabakh: “Now this additional evidence of war crimes on the part of Yerevan can be used as political pressure to get the rest of the maps of the mined fields.”

The expert added that since Armenia has already issued a map of the minefields of Aghdam, in the future, it will be meaningless for Yerevan to deny the existence of maps, and this will be interpreted as an attempt to achieve some political benefits.

Regarding the parliamentary elections to be held in Armenia on June 20, Tsukerman noted that according to polls, the political alliance of former Armenian President Robert Kocharyan is also popular among the population, which is associated with the revanchist mood prevailing in the country.

“The latest polls in Armenia (if they can be considered accurate) show that despite Pashinyan’s repeated failures, his party is leading by a fairly decent margin, but in recent weeks the “Armenia” political alliance, led by Kocharyan, has been pushing forward quite aggressively. Early elections are to be held on June 20, and if Pashinyan’s party fails to agree with the Armenia alliance, everything will lead to a change in power in Armenia. The fact that such a figure as Kocharyan is successfully gaining votes in polls proves that the mood in Armenia is quite revanchist, and there is dissatisfaction with Pashinyan’s behavior and role in the November and January agreements,” the expert said.

She noted that the nationalist mood in the Armenian society, coupled with the change of government in Armenia if this happens, may lead to further violation of the agreements mentioned above: “Recently, there has been a growing number of such violations on the Armenia-Azerbaijan border by Armenian military personnel, which indicates a political trend in Armenia.”