“Azerbaijan starts and wins” national campaign launched by initiative of Zerkalo newspaper is a “brain storm”, an attempt to find out and generalize the public opinion, head of the Baku Office of the Institute for War and Peace Reporting (IWPR), journalist Shahin Rzayev stated in an interview with PanARMENIAN.Net reporter. “I myself took part in the campaign. Some participants did offer to launch a propaganda war but it doesn’t mean that all agree with the viewpoint,’ the Azeri journalist remarked.
At the same time he noted that “some Armenian political figures have waged propaganda war against Azerbaijan since 1980-ies. At that time we spoke of fraternity and were proud of our internationalism. In this issue we fell behind hopelessly,” he said. However, head of the IWPR Baku Office emphasized that information war is better than a real one. “I am going to write one more article where I will offer to organize more discussions of disputable issues. The parties to the Karabakh conflict are not well aware of each other’s positions and warmongers use it,” Rzayev considers.
He subjected the anti-Armenian hysteria to sharp criticism and said, ” I think that those who spread the hysteria do alienate Karabakh from Azerbaijan and thus favor the opposition party,’ he remarked.
Rzayev is convinced that in the 21st century political disputes are not solved by territorial invasions. “There exists the international law. Armenia has undertaken certain commitments at the entry to the UN, OSCE and the Council of Europe. That is why all the disputable issues should be settled within the international law framework. The same refers to the self-determination of the Karabakh Armenians. But to settle the self-determination issue we should return to the legal field that doesn’t admit annexation and seizure of land belonging to another states. In my opinion, the Armenian leadership came to understand it and demonstrates readiness for the stepwise settlement of the conflict,” he said.
