Armenia and Azerbaijan agreed on their readiness to mutually recognize each other’s territorial integrity. This was stated by Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan during a meeting of the Supreme Eurasian Economic Council in Moscow, Russian media reported.
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said that Baku has no territorial claims against Armenia. According to Aliyev, the countries have the opportunity to reach a peace agreement after Yerevan expressed its readiness to recognize the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan.
Last Monday, at a press conference in Yerevan, Pashinyan stated that Armenia recognizes the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan, which includes the self-proclaimed Nagorno-Karabakh (the Armenian name is Artsakh), but subject to the security of the Armenian population.
However, part of the border between Armenia and Azerbaijan has not yet been demarcated. Yerevan accuses Baku of occupying part of the Armenian territories. Azerbaijan denies the accusations.
On May 25, talks are held between the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan with the participation of Russian President Vladimir Putin. According to Kommersant, the parties will sign three joint documents at the meeting. One of them will be the fifth tripartite statement by Putin, Aliyev and Pashinyan since November 2020. The second document will deal with the unblocking of transport communications in the South Caucasus.
- The territory of Nagorno-Karabakh is considered part of Azerbaijan under international law. The population of the region is predominantly ethnic Armenians. Since the early 1990s, Baku has not controlled much of the region. Representatives of the Armenian community proclaimed an independent republic, which was not recognized by any of the countries, including Armenia.
- Following the results of a short-term war in the fall of 2020, Azerbaijan and Armenia, through the mediation of Russia, signed an agreement on the cessation of hostilities. Under the treaty, which provoked opposition protests in Yerevan, Baku regained control of a significant part of the territories of Karabakh and the adjacent regions of Azerbaijan, occupied by Armenian troops in the early 1990s. Russian peacekeeping forces were deployed in the region.
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