Pashinyan's Proposal to Aliyev: Khondanyan

The Prime Minister of Armenia, Nikol Pashinyan, has proposed to Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev that the foreign ministers hold a two-day meeting to agree on one or two unratified articles of the Peace Agreement, and then the leaders of the countries should sign the agreement before the COP-29 event takes place in Baku. This was reported by the Chairman of the National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Foreign Relations, Sarkis Khondanyan, who commented on President Aliyev's recent statements at the request of Armenpress.

- Mr. Khondanyan, President Aliyev stated on October 14, while receiving the newly appointed Belgian ambassador in Azerbaijan, that it is the Republic of Armenia that has refused to continue negotiations in Brussels. However, the Armenian government presented it somewhat differently.

- To answer that question, we simply need to refer to the facts. In June 2023, within the framework of the European Political Community summit in Chisinau, a five-sided meeting took place between French President Macron, German Chancellor Scholz, President of the EU Council Michel, Azerbaijani President Aliyev, and Armenian Prime Minister Pashinyan, as a platform for summarizing the discussions in Brussels. An agreement was reached to hold the next meeting in this format in October of the same year, during the European Political Community summit in Granada, after an upcoming trilateral meeting in Brussels. The trilateral meeting in Brussels took place on July 15, 2023, while Azerbaijan declined to participate in the meeting in Granada.

Immediately after Granada, EU Council President Michel announced that a meeting of the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan was scheduled for the end of October, and both sides had already given their consent. However, subsequently, the Azerbaijani side also refused this meeting.

On February 2, 2024, during a telephone conversation between Prime Minister Pashinyan and President Michel, the latter proposed to hold a trilateral meeting in Brussels in early March. An agreement was reached to hold the meeting on March 12. Later on, Azerbaijan also declined this meeting.

In April, Charles Michel addressed Prime Minister Pashinyan and President Aliyev in a letter, proposing to hold a trilateral meeting in Brussels. Prime Minister Pashinyan gave his consent, while the Azerbaijani side refused to meet.

Additionally, I note that Azerbaijan has yet to fulfill several humanitarian commitments undertaken during the meetings held in Brussels regarding the release of prisoners of war and other detained individuals.

- But Azerbaijan argues that Armenia refused an invitation to meet in the framework of the European Political Community held in July in the United Kingdom.

- Armenia did not refuse; rather, it deemed it inappropriate to meet in a new format and suggested Azerbaijan hold a bilateral meeting in the UK, which Azerbaijan declined, having previously also refused five-sided format meetings. As far as I know, during informal talks in Moscow on October 7-8, Prime Minister Pashinyan proposed to President Aliyev to hold a bilateral meeting. More specifically, it was proposed that the foreign ministers hold a two-day meeting to agree on one or two unratified articles of the Peace Agreement, and then the leaders should sign the agreement before the COP-29 event in Baku. Frankly, I am not aware of Azerbaijan's response, but I hope this logic can be realized.