Russian President Vladimir Putin regretted that there are still sometimes problems in Nagorno-Karabakh and periodically not without casualties.
"There are, unfortunately, problems, there are incidents. Unfortunately, there are still casualties," the Russian leader said, noting that it would be useful to continue the discussion on the settlement of the situation in the region in a trilateral format. "The Armenian Prime Minister [Nikol Pashinyan] will join us in a while, and we will continue this discussion," he said, opening a bilateral meeting with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev.
At the same time, Putin noted the positive role of Russian peacekeepers in resolving the situation in Nagorno-Karabakh.
"Regarding the Nagorno Karabakh settlement <...> here and our peacekeepers, I think, play a positive role, the Russian-Turkish ceasefire monitoring center works effectively," he said.
Putin said it's important to discuss what's already been done, and what everyone should do, "not only to prevent something like this from happening, but on the contrary, [to] create conditions for calming the situation and developing the situation in the region in a way that would allow people to live peacefully, and countries to develop."
The Russian head of state said that Friday's trilateral meeting between the leaders of Russia, Azerbaijan and Armenia on resolving the situation around Karabakh would be crucial.
"Just now I spoke with my colleagues, for example, from the Russian government, which you know well, and which deals with issues related to economic problems, with the unblocking of transport corridors [in the region]. I also spoke with the defense minister, with the director of the Federal Security Service, to whom the Border Guard Service [of Russia] reports, which makes a significant contribution to the settlement," Putin said, adding that there were a lot of questions on this topic accumulated.
GSV "Russia - Islamic World"
Photo: Alexander Ryumin / TASS
Based on materials from TASS