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United StatesArmenia-Azerbaijan: talks after new clashes
On Monday, Armenia and Azerbaijan held US-mediated talks in Washington, hours after the renewed bombing of the border.
The foreign ministers of these two rival Caucasus countries were received by the US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken.
AFP
“The United States is engaged in peace negotiations between Armenia and Azerbaijan,” Antony Blinken said before the meeting. “Direct dialogue is the best way to achieve lasting peace and we are happy to support it,” he said, greeting the “courage” of both sides.
A US official speaking on condition of anonymity assured that it was less a question of “negotiations” of peace in the strict sense, than of offering the opportunity for belligerents to meet and talk.
Just a week ago, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev pledged “not to use force” at a summit in Russia with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
But, during the night from Sunday to Monday, “units of the Azerbaijani armed forces opened fire (…) on Armenian positions located in the eastern sector of the border,” the Armenian Defense Ministry said in a statement, adding that ” there were no casualties. ”For its part, the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry accused the Armenian forces of having fired“ with light weapons of different calibers ”at the positions in Baku, without even reporting losses.
territorial disputes
The Kremlin, which traditionally plays the role of arbiter in this region, called on Yerevan and Baku to “steer clear of any action that could lead to an escalation of tensions”.
Clashes take place regularly on the border between Armenia and Azerbaijan. In September, fighting between the two countries resulted in 286 deaths on both sides and raised fears of a large-scale war, such as the one that killed more than 6,500 in 2020.
This conflict is linked to territorial disputes, particularly around Nagorny Karabakh, a mountainous region populated mainly by Armenians that separated from Azerbaijan in the early 1990s with the help of Yerevan. A first war later caused more than 30,000 deaths.
Since the 2020 war, interrupted by a Moscow-sponsored ceasefire, Armenia and Azerbaijan have been engaged in difficult peace talks, with several parallel initiatives.
The European Union brought together Nikol and Ilham Aliev in Brussels on several occasions, and the United States had already invited Armenian and Azerbaijani foreign ministers for discussions on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in September.
Russia, which views the Caucasus as its backyard, has a weak view of these efforts, suspecting that the West wants to compete with it while it is busy with its invasion of Ukraine.
(AFP)
