https://arka.am-YEREVAN, April 22. /ARKA/. One-sided concessions (to Azerbaijan), even with agreed borders will not ensure security and stability, says former Armenian Foreign Minister Ara Ayvazyan.
“Unilateral concessions, even with agreed borders – and this was confirmed by the Armenian authorities – will provide neither security nor stability. On the contrary, our vital territories, natural security lines are being destroyed and roads are being opened for future aggressive actions,” he said Monday at a press conference called by the founders of the All-Armenian Council of Diplomats NGO.
Ayvazyan noted that the authorities want to convince the society that delimitation and demarcation of the border will become an additional factor of security and stability. He pointed out that many countries do not have clearly demarked borders with their neighbors and it is not perceived as a factor of threat to national security.
At the same time, the former minister pointed out that the authorities threaten that if this process is abandoned, there will be a new war.
“That is, this process is carried out under the threat of force or use of force, which in itself means that this whole action is contrary to international law,” Ayvazyan said.
Armenia’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement on April 19 that a preliminary agreement was reached during the eighth round of talks toward defining the frontier on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border. According to it, Armenia will return four abandoned border villages to Azerbaijan that Yerevan controlled since the early 1990s.
The parties agreed also that the process of border delimitation will be based on the Alma-Ata Declaration of 1991. This basic principle will be fixed in the draft regulations of joint activities of the commissions. The draft of this document should be agreed by July 1, 2024.
The need to take measures for simultaneous and parallel deployment of border services on the agreed sections of the border line was also agreed.
The parties also agreed that after the approval of the regulation by the parties they will continue the process of delimitation of all other sections of the border, including enclaves and exclaves.