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Nikol Pashinyan on Thursday condemned the latest Azerbaijani aggression which left four Armenian soldiers dead in Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh).

The servicemen were killed after the Artsakh Defense Army positions in the Martuni and Martakert districts came under Azerbaijani shelling early in Wednesday.

"Expressing my condolences to the relatives and friends of the victims, I must emphasize that this military provocation had been prepared for a long time by information attacks of Azerbaijan, as if the Nagorno-Karabakh Defense Army was violating the ceasefire regime in different parts of the contact line. The fictitiousness of Azerbaijani media publications has been consistently demonstrated by the authorities of Nagorno-Karabakh, under the conditions of which it becomes obvious that Azerbaijan is pursuing a consistent policy of escalating the situation and depopulating Nagorno-Karabakh. That is, essentially, the policy we have been warning about for a long time," the Armenian premier told a cabinet meeting.

"Azerbaijan's actions are more and more visibly perceived just like that by the international community as well, the latest proof of which is the resolution 2256 adopted by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe last week. In point 15 of that resolution, PACE records: "The Assembly is extremely concerned about the hostile and threatening rhetoric against Armenians at the highest levels of Azerbaijan's leadership and calls on Azerbaijan to reject such rhetoric and take steps to combat both hate speech, including by public and high-ranking officials, and hate crimes."

"In point 8 of the same resolution, the Assembly records: "The current unstable situation may lead to the fact that the Armenian population of Nagorno-Karabakh will have to leave their homes and communities. In this context, the Assembly urgently calls to resolve the issues of rights and security of the Armenian population of Nagorno-Karabakh through dialogue between Baku and Stepanakert, as well as through neutral international involvement in any peace mechanism."

"Returning to the provocation of June 27, I must emphasize that its purpose is to neutralize efforts to establish peace between Armenia and Azerbaijan and to address the rights and security issues of the people of Nagorno-Karabakh," Pashinyan said.