Russian MFA welcomes normalization efforts between Armenia, Türkiye

The Russian Foreign Ministry has welcomed efforts for the normalization of relations between Türkiye and Armenia.

The Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Galuzin has commented on those initiatives during a phone conversation with his Armenian counterpart, Ruben Rubinyan, Caliber.Az reports.

"The Russian side reaffirmed its readiness to continue assisting in finding common ground between Yerevan and Ankara," the Russian ministry’s statement said. The diplomats also discussed the development of cooperation among the South Caucasus countries within the "3+3" format, which entails Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia as well as Russia, Iran, and Türkiye.

As part of the rapprochement process between Türkiye and Armenia a group of Turkish journalists were recently invited to Armenia and inspected the common border. In September 2024 the countries respective heads of state, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan met in New York on the sidelines of a UN assembly.

A formal meeting in either Ankara or Yerevan is still being organized. Another important event was the decision by the Armenian government to open the Margara (Alican) checkpoint between Armenia and Türkiye on March 21 for a ten-day period as part of a decision to send humanitarian aid to Syria through Turkish territory. The border between Armenia and Türkiye has been closed since 1993 as a response to the outbreak of the Karabakh War, in which Armenian separatist forces illegally entered and occupied vast sovereign territories of Azerbaijan.

These areas were successfully liberated by Azerbaijan's armed forces in the course of the Second Karabakh War in 2020, with the signing of a formal peace agreement between the two South Caucasus neighbours currently in the works. During this period, the border was only opened in February 2023 to allow humanitarian aid to pass through, following the deadly Türkiye–Syria earthquake. 

By Nazrin Sadigova