May 10, 2023

U.S. Hosts Armenian and Azerbaijani Foreign Ministers for Possible Roadmap to Peace Treaty

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken with Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan and Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov @ Official Photo .

As talks between Yerevan and Baku continue, with a spate of meetings between the leaders scheduled in the near future, following last week’s bilateral negotiations between the two foreign ministers in the United States, Osservatorio Balcani e Caucaso Transeuropa has published another of my updates on the Armenia-Azerbaijan normalisation process.

On 1 May 2023, the Armenian and Azerbaijani foreign ministers, Ararat Mirzoyan and Jeyhun Bayramov were hosted in the United States by U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken. Though some had speculated that such a meeting was being planned, what appeared to be a general stagnation in the normalisation process between the two countries meant that few expected it.

 

Nonetheless, a day before the ministers and their delegations headed off to Washington D.C., the Azerbaijani Turan News Agency and Armenian Hraparak both published pieces saying that the meeting would take place. Turan also said its sources had informed them that the meeting could last ‘several days,’ an unprecedented development since the 2020 war.

 

An announcement posted on the website of the Armenian National Assembly confirmed that the same day – parliamentary vice-president Ruben Rubinyan would join Mirzoyan as part of the delegation in the U.S. from 29 April to 5 May. There was also speculation that a ‘roadmap’ towards the normalisation of relations could be signed, though none was announced or signed.

 

Speaking in Yerevan on 28 April, French foreign minister Catherine Colonna had also said that there was the possibility Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev could meet on the sidelines of the upcoming second European Political Community (EPC) event in Chisinau, Moldova, on 1 June. Colonna had already visited Baku the same week.

 

[…]

 

On 8 May, the Financial Times reported that sources told it that Aliyev and Pashinyan would meet once again for talks facilitated by European Council President Charles Michel this weekend. It also reported that the 1 June meeting on the sidelines of the EPC is still on the cards, adding that German chancellor Olaf Scholz and French president Emmanuel Macron would join them.

The full article can be read here.

 

 

CONFLICT VOICES e-BOOKS

 

Conflict Voices – December 2010

Short essays on the Nagorno Karabakh Conflict
Download in English | Russian

 

Conflict Voices – May 2011

Short essays on the Nagorno Karabakh Conflict
Download in English | Russian

Armenia-Azerbaijan Dialogue – Flogging a Dead Horse?

Armenia-Azerbaijan Dialogue – Flogging a Dead Horse?

Even though many believed a second Trump presidency was unlikely or even impossible, his re-election last November demonstrated how many people prefer to favour dreams over reality, transforming fears into self-fulfilling prophecies. This is a situation that can best describe how Track II diplomacy in the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict has been conducted over time.

read more
Can Pashinyan’s “Real Armenia” Satisfy both Baku and Armenian voters?

Can Pashinyan’s “Real Armenia” Satisfy both Baku and Armenian voters?

The Center of Analysis of International Relations has just published my latest on the continuing impasse and discussion on Baku’s demand to remove the current preamble to Armenia’s Constitution that I’ve been consistently covering since late January last year. This has also includes pieces mentioning attempts by various commentators in Armenia and Azerbaijan including AIR’s Farid Shafiyev.

read more