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President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey has effectively set a new precondition for Armenia, according to Varuzhan Geghamyan, an expert on the Middle East and the South Caucasus.

"Turkish President Erdogan, in fact, set a new precondition that will inevitably come up at the very moment when the incumbent Armenian authorities sign a “peace treaty” amounting to new capitulation by Armenia,” he wrote on Telegram on Thursday.

“The matter concerns the military penalties (contributions), which Azerbaijan will demand from Armenia "for holding Karabakh for 30 years and its destruction". This very idea was voiced by Erdogan almost verbatim in the south of the occupied Kashatagh region of Artsakh on Oct. 20.

“Incidentally, something similar happened in the summer of 2021, when Erdogan and his spouse said during their visit to Shushi that the Armenian prisoners of war should be returned only in exchange for more concessions from Armenia. No POWs have been returned to date,” Geghamyan said, stressing the need for a regime change in Armenia.