New meetings due with Karabakh Armenians in Ganja, Barda, Aghdam
Without Russian peacekeepers

KARABAKH  01 March 2023 - 15:10

So, the regional situation is beginning to change slowly but surely. As we remember, in Munich, President Ilham Aliyev openly stated that negotiations on a post-conflict settlement are being conducted on two separate tracks.

The first track is the bilateral negotiations between Baku and Yerevan, which should end with the signing of a peace treaty and mutual recognition of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the two countries. According to information available to Caliber.Az from diplomatic sources, in recent days, the texts of the peace treaty have been exchanged between the two countries' foreign ministries and the work is underway towards its approval, but it is necessary to speed up the process here. Yerevan is the hindering party in this process.

The second track is a dialogue between Baku and its citizens of Armenian ethnicity, compactly living in Azerbaijan's Karabakh economic region, about their reintegration. As Aliyev noted in Munich, before [the former separatist "state minister"] Ruben Vardanyan's "landing" in Karabakh, contacts between Baku and local Armenians had already taken place, but this process was disrupted by an oligarch embedded in the region.

After the obstacle in the person of Vardanyan was eliminated, contacts immediately resumed. President Aliyev appointed a deputy from the ruling party, Ramin Mammadov, a native of Aghdara [which has now been divided among Aghdam, Tartar and Kalbajar districts], as a representative. By the way, choosing a parliamentary line for negotiations with the Karabakh Armenians is a diplomatically correct move.

MP Mammadov has started negotiations on the reintegration of ethnic Armenians of Karabakh into the Azerbaijani state. The first contact took place and was constructive. According to information available from diplomatic sources, contacts will continue, and Barda, Ganja and Aghdam are considered meeting venues. Accordingly, the participation of Russian peacekeepers in the peace talks is not planned for the future. We are talking about a direct dialogue between Azerbaijan and its citizens, which has nothing to do with the Russian peacekeepers or any other external actors.

As for the eco-campaign on Lachin road, it goes on as usual. The protesters have their own demands, which have not yet been met, which means that the protest will continue.

What do we see in fact? Baku speaks directly to its citizens of Armenian origin, the myth of the blockage has finally collapsed, and the money of Ruben Vardanyan and his supporters for the PR of the "blockage and genocide" has been ruined. A bad investment.

Caliber.Az