YEREVAN (Azatutyun.am)—Armenia and Azerbaijan continue to disagree on some key terms of a bilateral peace treaty discussed by them, parliament speaker Alen Simonyan said on Tuesday.
“There are at least three or four things regarding which … we have differences,” Simonian told reporters. He refused to disclose them.
Simonyan said that the signing of such a treaty is also hampered by new conditions periodically set by Azerbaijan as well as Azerbaijani “provocations” on the border between the two states.
Meanwhile, Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov accused Armenia of such obstruction.
“At the moment, the Armenian side is obstructing the signing of the peace treaty,” Bayramov said after holding talks in Baku with his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov. “We can see that they also refused to participate in the third round of negotiations.”
He appeared to refer to Yerevan’s decision to cancel in late December a planned meeting of the Russian, Armenian and Azerbaijani foreign ministers in protest against Azerbaijan’s blockade of the Lachin corridor.
Lavrov also mentioned that decision when he spoke during a joint news conference with Bayramov. He said he is still ready to organize the meeting with Bayramov and Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan in Moscow.
“The Armenian side has stated that it has no objection [to the meeting] but has not yet given its final consent,” added Lavrov.
Despite the continuing Azerbaijani blockade, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan agreed to meet with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev in Munich on February 18 for talks organized by U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
Following the Munich talks Aliyev spoke of “progress” in Armenia’s position on the peace treaty which he hopes will help to restore full Azerbaijani control over Nagorno-Karabakh. Pashinyan’s political opponents at home renewed afterwards their allegations that he has accepted Azerbaijan’s terms of the peace deal.
Meeting with Lavrov on Monday, Aliyev expressed hope that 2023 will be a “breakthrough year for the normalization of relations between Azerbaijan and Armenia.”
