Topics Raised by Mirzoyan at the CIS Foreign Ministers Council

On October 14, Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan participated in the meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers of the CIS member states, held in Minsk, Belarus. During the event, which was conducted in both narrow and expanded formats, the heads of the foreign political departments of the CIS member states exchanged views on regional and international issues, thoroughly discussing matters related to political, trade-economic, cultural, and humanitarian cooperation within the CIS framework.

The Foreign Ministers summarized the work carried out over the past thirty years since the establishment of the CIS, evaluating completed programs and considering the prospects for the organization’s development and priority action areas.

During the meeting, Minister Mirzoyan emphasized the importance of adherence by member states to the principles of sovereignty, equal rights of peoples, and the right to self-determination, the inviolability of state borders, the non-use of force and the threat of force, and the peaceful resolution of disputes, particularly in the context of the military aggression unleashed by Azerbaijan against Artsakh.

Highlighting the necessity of immediate release of Armenian prisoners of war and other detained individuals, as well as the preservation of Armenian cultural and spiritual heritage in the territories under the control of Azerbaijani armed forces, Minister Mirzoyan also stressed that a comprehensive resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict under the mandate of the OSCE Minsk Group would substantially contribute to the establishment of lasting peace in the South Caucasus.

As a result of the Council of Foreign Ministers meeting, several declarations were adopted, which will be presented the next day for approval by the Council of CIS Heads of State. Additionally, the program for multilevel consultations between foreign political departments within the CIS for 2022 was agreed upon, along with a declaration regarding strengthening the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention among the CIS member states, as well as a decision to create a base organization on issues of countering terrorism and other manifestations of extremism, among other documents.