Armenian, Russian and Azerbaijani Foreign Ministers, Ararat Mirzoyan, Sergei Lavrov and Jeyhun Bayramov, discussed the joint efforts aimed at settling Armenia-Azerbaijan relations during their meeting in Astana on Friday, Russia’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

“A substantive discussion was held on issues relating to the unblocking of economic and transportation communications in the region within the frames of the trilateral working group co-chaired by the deputy prime ministers of Armenia, Russia and Azerbaijan. A discussion was also held on the work of the Armenian-Azerbaijani border delimitation commission with the consulting support of Russia and the dialogue of public representatives and experts of the three countries. A special focus was paid on the process of the negotiations around the signing of a peace treaty between Armenia and Azerbaijan.An agreement was reached to continue the trilateral contacts at different levels in the future,” the Russian foreign ministry said.

Meanwhile, Mirzoyan said that Friday’s meeting was a good opportunity to discuss and try to find a solution on settling Armenia-Azerbaijan relations.
“Events of various facets are being held here [Astana]. This enables us to have meeting about regional issues on the margins of the international summit, among then the relations between our close friends Armenia and Azerbaijan, in the context of the agreements reached between Russian President Vladimir Putin, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev on November 9, 2020, January 11 and November 26, 2021. These statements signed on the high level laid the foundation for normalization of all aspects of relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan and the establishment of peace and stability in South Caucasus,” Lavrov said during the meeting with Mirzoyan and Bayramov.

The Russian foreign minister added that agreeing upon the peace treaty is a separate topic, in addition to the agreements on unblocking of economic and transport connections and implementing delimitation through the bilateral commission between Armenia and Azerbaijan with advisory support of Russia.

“Time passes quickly and developments are taking place quickly. That’s why I think today is a good opportunity to talk about this topic and to see what we can report to our leaders regarding the implementation of the agreements they signed. I am sure that during this meeting we will be able to have a better understanding on how to move forward,” Lavrov said.