Foreign Minister Zohrab Mnatsakanian on Monday dismissed serious concerns voiced by critics of the Armenian government over a series of high-level Armenian-Azerbaijani negotiations held in recent months.
Mnatsakanian and his Azerbaijani counterpart Elmar Mammadyarov met on January 16 for the fourth time in six months. They both described the meeting in Paris as “useful” and pledged to hold more “results-oriented” negotiations on resolving the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.
In a joint statement, the U.S., Russian and French mediators co-heading the OSCE Minsk Group said Mnatsakanian and Mammadyarov acknowledged the need for “concrete measures to prepare the populations for peace.”
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev fuelled more talk of major progress towards the conflict’s resolution when they met in Davos on January 22.
Some Armenian opposition politicians and commentators critical of the government speculated that Pashinian may have agreed to make significant territorial concessions to Azerbaijan. Pashinian brushed aside these “conspiracy theories” on January 23.
Mnatsakanian also deplored the critics’ “defeatist” claims. “I was somewhat surprised and wondered with if we have some defeatist sentiment within the society or have lost our self-confidence,” he told reporters. “I am sure that there is no such sentiment in our society.”
Mnatsakanian insisted that the government will not deviate from Armenia’s traditional position on a Karabakh settlement. “We have made clear that the questions of [Karabakh’s] status and security remain Armenia’s overriding priorities,” he said.
The minister did not shed more light on his talks with Mammadyarov or comment on chances of a breakthrough in the peace process.
Pashinian insisted that he did not discuss with Aliyev any “concrete detail” of a possible peace accord.
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