Russian President Vladimir Putin welcomed the upcoming meeting in Brussels between Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan. According to the Russian head of state, it is important to hold a dialogue between the parties.
"I agree with both colleagues that the more contacts, including direct ones, the better, direct bilateral contacts, in general, are a priority," he said during talks with Aliyev and Pashinyan on Friday.
"I know that you also have a meeting scheduled in Brussels in the near future, you have agreed to come there. We also welcome it. The more opportunities for direct communication, the better," the Russian leader said to Aliyev and Pashinyan.
The Russian President said that he recently communicated with the head of the European Council, Charles Michel, in this regard. "He is waiting for you. I hope we will make some step forward and it will be possible to make further steps already on other platforms," Putin noted. "We only welcome the involvement of partners in this dialogue, the main thing is that it goes to good use," said the Russian head of state.
Earlier it was reported that Michel had agreed to meet with Aliyev and Pashinyan in Brussels on December 15 during the summit of the Eastern Partnership. Putin had a telephone conversation with the chairman of the European Council on November 24 and talked about the steps being taken to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.
Interest in resolving the conflict
The Russian President considers the interest of Azerbaijani and Armenian leaders in the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict to be extremely important.
"It seems to me that in fact what you have just said is very important - both the president of Azerbaijan and the prime minister of Armenia. There is interest from both sides in developing the normalization of the situation, developing the situation in a positive way," the Russian head of state addressed Ilham Aliyev and Nikol Pashinyan.
Speaking about the unblocking of communications in the region, Putin stressed that "everyone is interested in this." "And including Russia, bearing in mind that we are all close countries, we are neighbors, we have a large volume of trade," Putin noted.
The Russian leader also recalled agreements "to establish work on border demarcation and delimitation in the near future." "Let's talk about it today, too," he suggested. At the same time, the Russian President acknowledged that this "issue is complicated, it was inherited from the Soviet Union, there was no border there."
GSV "Russia - Islamic World"
Photo: official website of the President of the Russian Federation
Based on materials from TASS