Russia records the positive attitude of Armenia and Azerbaijan to reach mutually acceptable package agreements on Nagorno-Karabakh, which in the future could be the basis for the transition to the project cooperation, Alexei Zaitsev, deputy director of the Information and press department of the Russian MFA, said at a briefing on Thursday.
According to Zaitsev, in matters of the Nagorno-Karabakh settlement, "it is extremely important to provide opportunities for finding mutually acceptable solutions." "The readiness to open a new page in the relations and their gradual normalization, expressed both by Baku and Yerevan at the highest level, confirms the objective demand for such an intention," he said. - "We concentrate on such positive moments in our work".
"For our part, we note the positive attitude of Yerevan and Baku towards achieving mutually acceptable package agreements, which will enable to transfer joint work to the plane of project cooperation in the future," Zaitsev pointed out.
He also drew attention to "problems of incidents at separate sections of the Armenian-Azerbaijani border," the creation of a commission to delimit the state border between the parties with its subsequent demarcation throughout "Moscow sees as a stable and long-term solution". "The Russian side has formulated and submitted to Yerevan and Baku proposals to ensure the launch of a relevant negotiation process. We are waiting for the reaction of our partners," he added.
Armenian prime minister Nikol Pashinyan said at an August 12 cabinet meeting that the republic was ready to resume talks with Azerbaijan to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and was waiting for specific proposals from the Minsk group of the Organization for security and cooperation in Europe (OSCE Minsk group). At the end of September, Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev said in an interview with the France 24 TV channel that he was ready to negotiate with the Armenian prime minister on condition that the meeting would be organized by the OSCE Minsk group.
On September 27, 2020, the situation in the conflict zone around Nagorno-Karabakh escalated, and active battles broke out in the disputed territory. On November 9, Russian president Vladimir Putin, Armenian prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev signed a joint statement on full cessation of military operations in the conflict zone. According to the document, the Azerbaijani and Armenian sides stopped at the occupied positions, a number of areas came under Baku's control, and Russian peacekeepers were deployed along the line of contact and the Lachin corridor.
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Photo: Russian Foreign Ministry
Based on materials from TASS