In the weeks since the first Azerbaijani bombs fell on the people of Artsakh, hundreds have been killed or injured and thousands have been displaced from their homes, sleeping out in the open for fear of drones or artillery or bombs.

Historic churches and cities have been bombarded and destroyed. Militants from Syria have been deployed as a mercenary fighting force by Azerbaijan and its Turkish sponsors.

Despite this illegal war, the people of Artsakh are still standing. The people of Armenia are still standing. And we will continue to stand with them.

This war did not happen overnight. It is the result of a corrupt regime in Baku offering its people a violent ethno-nationalism instead of peace, prosperity and freedom, which they cannot deliver.

But it is also the result of United States’ policy towards Azerbaijan and Turkey that has failed spectacularly. For too long, the United States has espoused a false equivalency between Azerbaijan, as it launches attack after attack, and Armenia and Artsakh, as they defend their lives and homes.

Presidents Aliyev and Erdogan must understand that they cannot resolve a decades-long dispute through the indiscriminate use of force against civilians, and the United States must not stand idly by as they attempt to do so.

The only resolution of this dispute can be through negotiations, not raining artillery and bombs on Armenian civilians. America should stand with the fledgling democracy in Stepanakert, not with the autocratic Aliyev regime. And if Turkey and Azerbaijan are not interested in negotiating the issues involving Artsakh, it is time for the United States to recognize Nagorno-Karabakh as an independent state.