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Rhetorical Questions To Clinton's Visit

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  • Rhetorical Questions To Clinton's Visit

    RHETORICAL QUESTIONS TO CLINTON'S VISIT
    Leonid MARTIROSSIAN

    Editor-in-Chief of Azat Artsakh newspaper
    Wednesday, 30 May 2012 09:54

    As it is known, a visit of US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to
    the South Caucasus region is expected. There is no doubt that the
    agenda of the visit also includes the issue of Karabakh settlement,
    which Mrs. Clinton as a representative of the OSCE Minsk Group
    co-chair-state will certainly discuss with the Presidents of Armenia
    and Azerbaijan with the aim of "finding a mutually acceptable solution
    to the problem". All is seemingly understandable and logical, if not a
    "but" just running counter to the common logic.

    The matter is that the official website of the U.S. State Department
    has recently placed the annual report on human rights for 2011, where
    the section devoted to the Karabakh conflict reads: "Ethnic Armenian
    separatists, supported by Armenia, continue to control most of the
    Nagorno-Karabakh region of Azerbaijan and seven adjoining Azerbaijani
    territories". Agree, in this case the vocabulary and the conceptual
    formulations of the State Department do not differ at all from the
    Azerbaijani vocabulary, which official Baku put into propaganda
    circulation long ago. This fact is confirmed by the report itself,
    which contains a reference to the "government sources". Surely,
    the Azerbaijani government is meant.

    Frankly speaking, it seems that such a serious structure as the
    State Department is not serious about its own reputation, allowing
    Azerbaijan to include in the report pleasing-to-it formulations
    hat completely distort the essence of the conflict and the existing
    realities. I must say that the Azerbaijani authorities previously too
    managed to feed the State Department with obvious lie and to squeeze
    in its annual reports open anti-Armenian theses having nothing to
    do with the reality and relating, in particular, to the alleged use
    of the territory of Nagorno-Karabakh for drug trafficking. Later,
    such misinformation was, surely, denied by all means, including by
    representatives of corresponding international structures who had
    visited the NKR. But in this particular case, the authors of the
    above mentioned report do not even have to visit the conflict region
    to have a real idea of the situation. After all, the United States as
    a co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group have dealt with the Karabakh issue
    for many years, and the foreign ministry of this country should not
    make up an obviously biased report.

    In this context, a quite natural question arises: how does such a
    biased report relate to the position of the U.S. as an impartial
    mediator? Calling, even if with the filing of official Baku,
    Nagorno-Karabakh "Nagorno-Karabakh region of Azerbaijan", the State
    Department, actually, predetermines its status and, therefore,
    prejudges the outcome of the ongoing negotiations and thus makes
    them simply senseless. As you know, one of the basic principles, on
    which the OSCE mediators offer to resolve the Karabakh issue, is the
    people's right to self-determination. And another question to the State
    Department occurs here: how reasonable is to call "separatists" the
    people of Nagorno-Karabakh, which gained independence in the territory
    of its historical residence? Another question smoothly follows from
    this: is the concept of "separatism" applicable to Kosovo, which gained
    its independence in a foreign, i.e. the Serbian territory, but which
    was widely supported by Washington? And, finally, doesn't official
    Washington contradict itself, signing with one hand the notorious
    report and with the other hand - a document on financial assistance to
    the NKR? After all, these funds are allocated not only for humanitarian
    programs, but also for "projects and activities in Nagorno-Karabakh".

    The sounded questions are, surely, rhetorical, but they automatically
    lead to the idea of double standards. To specify, the double standards
    of the Obama administration, which poses itself as an apologist
    of democracy, but in practice supports the totalitarian regime
    of Azerbaijan, which unleashed a war for the extermination of the
    indigenous Armenian population of Nagorno-Karabakh, which proclaimed
    its independence just on the basis of democratic principles and in
    strict accordance with international law.

    And what is the reason for such a benevolent attitude towards
    Azerbaijan, which, despite numerous appeals of reputable institutions,
    including European and American, to stop the gross violations of
    human rights in the country, remains deaf to them? Is it not that
    the same U.S. and Europe have their own political and economic, in
    particular, energy interests in Azerbaijan, which outweigh the scale,
    on which are the human rights and democratic values? In addition,
    today Azerbaijan is a transit territory for the transfer of military
    equipment and troops of the U.S. and NATO to Afghanistan. Consequently,
    in response to these services, the civilized West shuts its eyes to
    the anti-democratic actions of Azerbaijan within the country and its
    militaristic licentiousness in the process of Karabakh settlement. Is
    it worth saying that such tolerance of Europe and the USA towards
    Azerbaijan is, without any doubt, dangerous not only for the region?

    And that will the pay for the deliberate unscrupulousness and
    ignorance of human and peoples' rights be? It would be good to ask
    these questions to Mrs. Clinton in Yerevan, since she will be asked
    entirely different questions in Baku.



    From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
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