"There are no mercenaries. We have an army of 100,000 soldiers," Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev said in an interview with Al Arabiya on Sunday. "I demand that La Belle France apologize and show responsibility."
Last week, French President Emmanuel Macron made the headline-grabbing claim that he had "reliable information" indicating that members of certain Syrian "jihadist groups" had arrived in the flaming Nagorno-Karabakh hotspot through the southern
Armenia, whose forces are fighting a heavy battle over the disputed mountainous enclave with neighboring Azerbaijan, voiced similar allegations. It directly accused
...Qatar's satrapy in Asia Minor...of ferrying in "mercenaries" to support its ally Azerbaijan’s war effort. Baku has brushed off those claims, dubbing them "cheap propaganda."
Officials in Baku maintain that the country’s military is well-staffed and doesn’t need any foreign manpower. "Azerbaijan doesn’t need any third-party participation," Hikmet Hajiyev, a senior adviser to the president, told RT.
The nation of 10 million people has "enough of our own resources" and also "enough reserve potential" to carry on fighting, the official stated. He also insisted that Turkey, which reaffirmed its unwavering support for Azerbaijan, isn’t involved in the conflict "as a third party." Ankara also denied sending Syrian mercenaries into Nagorno-Karabakh.