Yerevan: Nikol Pashinyan, the prime minister of Armenia, warned of the possibility of a new war with Azerbaijan on Friday, accusing Baku of committing "genocide" in the secessionist region of Nagorno-Karabakh, which is home to many Armenians.

Two wars between Baku and Yerevan have been fought over the mountainous enclave, and the signing of a peace treaty is still many years away.
Little progress has been made during negotiations mediated by the US, Russia, and the EU.

"A (new) war (with Azerbaijan) is very likely as long as a peace treaty has not been signed and such a treaty has not been ratified by the parliaments of the two countries," Pashinyan told AFP.

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The only road connecting Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenia was temporarily closed by Azerbaijan earlier in July, which caused tensions to rise.
Due to energy, food, and medicine shortages, the closure raised worries about a humanitarian crisis in the area.

Regarding the Karabakh crisis, Pashinyan told AFP in an interview, "We're talking about a process of genocide, not a preparation for one.

The two nations have been embroiled in a decades-long dispute over Nagorno-Karabakh; they fought two wars over the mountainous region, one in the 1990s and the other in 2020.
As part of a cease-fire agreement mediated by Russia in the autumn of 2020, Armenia gave up large portions of territory it had long controlled, and Moscow sent peacekeepers to the Lachin Corridor to guarantee unhindered travel between Armenia and Karabakh.

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Russia, a longtime regional power broker, is displeased with the growing diplomatic engagement of the European Union and the United States in the Caucasus.

Pashinyan stated that more pressure from both the West and Russia is required to get Baku to end its blockade of Nagorno-Karabakh after the most recent round of peace talks on July 15 in Brussels failed to produce a breakthrough.

"If, by some Western circles' logic, Russia is not living up to all of our expectations because it is not honoring its commitments, then similarly, Russia also tells us (the same) about the West," he said.

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The two nations have been embroiled in a decades-long dispute over Nagorno-Karabakh; they fought two wars over the mountainous region, one in the 1990s and the other in 2020.

As part of a cease-fire agreement mediated by Russia in the autumn of 2020, Armenia gave up large portions of territory it had long controlled, and Moscow sent peacekeepers to the Lachin Corridor to guarantee unhindered travel between Armenia and Karabakh.