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The Armenian Foreign Ministry has issued a statement in regard to the statement of Turkey’s Foreign Ministry on the elections being held in Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh).

Below is the full text of the statement published by the ministry’s press service:

"The statement of the Foreign Ministry of Turkey on the elections being held in Nagorno-Karabakh is yet another expression of Turkey's hostile policy towards the Armenian people.

In line with its traditional method of selective interpretation of international documents, on one hand Turkey invokes the relevant UN Security Council resolutions and on the other hand ignores their call to refrain from any hostile actions in the context of Nagorno-Karabakh conflict explicitly addressed to the states in the region. While it is Turkey that has been imposing land blockade on the Republic of Armenia for decades and supporting aggressive and atrocious actions unleashed against the people of Artsakh, including in April 2016.

The reference of Turkey’s Foreign Ministry to the OSCE principles and the Minsk process is equally groundless. We recall that the OSCE/CSCE decision of March 24, 1992, which laid a foundation for the Minsk process, refers to the elected representatives of Nagorno-Karabakh as a participant in the process. Elections must be held to have elected representatives, and from this viewpoint, elections conducted in Artsakh don’t contradict, but derive from the logic and fundamental documents of peaceful process.

Turkey's attempts to act as an international guardian of human rights and its appeals to the international community are more than bankrupted in the light of its constant violations of the rights of peoples and territorial integrity of its neighbors and its aggressive policy which breaches the norms of international law and democracy."