Yerevan voices negotiation principles at 1st meeting with OSCE Minsk Group since truce

The co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group arrived in Yerevan for the first time since the second Karabakh war and met with Foreign Minister Ara Ayvazyan and Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan earlier today on December 14.

The mediators discussed the post-war situation in Nagorno-Karabakh and the issues of restoring the rights and ensuring the security of Armenian residents in the region.

The co-chairs arrived in Yerevan after a visit to Baku, where the Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev stated that he had not invited them. President Ilham Aliyev also complained to them that the Minsk Group had not played a role in the resolution of the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh for 28 years.

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Meeting with the Foreign Minister of Armenia

During a meeting with OSCE Minsk Group representatives, Armenian FM Ara Ayvazyan named several priority issues for the continuation of negotiations:

• determination of the status of Karabakh on the basis of the people’s right to self-determination,
• the de-occupation of the territories seized by Azerbaijan,
• ensuring conditions for the safe return of the Karabakh Armenians to their homes,
• preservation of cultural and religious heritage.

FM Ara Ayvazyan also spoke about ‘Armenophobia, which continues to be heard in the statements of the Azerbaijani leadership‘. Ayvazyan says this indicates Azerbaijan’s ‘inability to constructively participate in the peace process, to refuse to use force or the threat of its use.’

Meeting with the prime minister

Nikol Pashinyan also spoke about the need to restore the negotiation process in the format of the Minsk Group.

Pashinyan also said it is a priority to determine the status of Nagorno-Karabakh and the realization of the people’s right to self-determination.

Pashinyan again raised the issue of de-occupation of the territories seized by Azerbaijan and ensuring conditions for the safe return of Armenian residents to the area.

Pashinyan spoke with the co-chairmen about the violation by Azerbaijan of the obligations assumed by the trilateral statement on the cessation of hostilities in Karabakh, and pointed at the clashes which took plac eon December 11-12 in the region of Khojavand.