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"I am bonded with the army, I have always stood with the army, but when this army is humiliated, shouldn't I be ashamed?” third President of Armenia, Chairman of the Republican Party of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan said at a meeting with supporters of the I Have the Honor bloc in the town of Masis on Tuesday.

“Shouldn't I be ashamed when Azeris invade our territory, capture our soldiers and the commander has no right to take a step, while his boss does nothing? This devil, this capitulator takes no action. Don’t I understand the state of mind of this commander? Of course I do, but since their hands are tied, what should we do other than being ashamed? This has to stop,” he said.

The former president stressed that for 30 years the Azerbaijanis did not dare to take any action, whereas now they take soldiers prisoner from Armenian territory and no measures are being taken to bring them back.

“And the leader shamelessly says, ‘Should we engage in fighting when they have just occupied 30% of Black Lake [Sev Lich]?” They led our army to a defeat and a rout. It is obvious that our army was not defeated,” Sargsyan said, blaming the current authorities for spoiling their ties with Russia.

“Russia would have continued to provide them with military and technical assistance, that is, it would have provided a huge amount of weapons to them without a single penny, as it was during our rule,” Sargsyan said.

According to him, the combat readiness of the army depends not only on weapons, but also on soldiers with weapon master skills, stressing the need to focus on efforts towards making the troops more combat-ready.