YEREVAN, December 13. /TASS/. The platform offered by Russia for holding talks between Armenia and Azerbaijan may be ineffective as the clauses of the November 9, 2020 statement by the leaders of the three countries on the cessation of hostilities in Nagorno-Karabakh have been violated, Sargis Khandanyan, chairman of the Armenian parliament’s Foreign Relations Committee, said at a briefing.
"And unfortunately, today we’ve appeared in a situation where main principled issues of the November 9 statement relating to ensuring the security of the Nagorno-Karabakh Armenians and their stay in Nagorno-Karabakh, also relating to the Lachin Corridor haven’t been fulfilled, and are disrupted. That legitimate concern and question still remains," he said, responding to a journalist's question about how effective the Russian platform could be given the violations of the November 9 statement.
According to Khandanyan, Yerevan considers the continuity of the negotiating logic, shaped during several rounds of meetings in Washington and Brussels, very important. "Armenia is always ready for talks," Khandanyan emphasized. "Unfortunately, in the past months we’ve seen that Azerbaijan is the one who’s avoiding the negotiations and not participating. We expect our colleagues to be able to bring Azerbaijan to the negotiations table," he added.
The lawmaker also surmised that "changing the platforms of negotiations is a tactics by Azerbaijan in order to avoid negotiations [altogether]."
He also noted that if Azerbaijan confirms the principles already agreed upon as a result of negotiations, the conclusion of a peace agreement would become merely a technical issue. A peace agreement could theoretically even be signed before the end of the year.