Azerbaijani's President Ilham Aliyev (L) and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan (R).
Nov 16,
2023. Posted by Balkan Periscope - Hellas
Azerbaijan
on Thursday refused to participate in normalisation talks with arch-foe Armenia
that were planned in the United States this month over what it said was
Washington’s “biased” position.
Baku and Yerevan have been locked in a decades-long territorial conflict over Azerbaijan’s Nagorno-Karabakh region, which Baku reclaimed in September after a lightning offensive against Armenian separatists.
Internationally
mediated peace talks between the ex-Soviet republics have seen little progress
but both countries’ leaders have said a comprehensive peace agreement could be
signed by the end of the year.
“We do not
consider it possible to hold the proposed meeting on the level of the Foreign
Ministers of Azerbaijan and Armenia in Washington on November 20, 2023,” Baku’s
foreign ministry said in a statement.
The move
followed a hearing in the US House Foreign Affairs Committee on Wednesday,
where, the ministry said, Assistant Secretary of State James O’Brien made
“one-sided and biased remarks” about Azerbaijan.
O’Brien
told the House Committee that “nothing will be normal with Azerbaijan after the
events of September 19 until we see progress on the peace track.”
“We’ve
cancelled a number of high-level visits, condemned (Baku’s) actions,” he added.
The
Azerbaijani foreign ministry said: “Such a unilateral approach by the United
States could lead to the loss of the United States’ mediation role.”
Armenian
Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said on Thursday that Yerevan’s “political will
to sign, in the coming months, a peace agreement with Azerbaijan remains
unwavering.”
Pashinyan
and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev have held several rounds of talks under
EU mediation.
But last
month, Aliyev refused to attend a round of negotiations with Pashinyan in
Spain, citing France’s “biased position.”
French
President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz had been scheduled
to join EU chief Charles Michel as mediators at those talks.
So far,
there has been no visible progress in EU efforts to organise a fresh round of
negotiations.
(AFP)