Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev were due to meet there on December 7.
Aliyev cancelled the meeting late last week, objecting to French President Emmanuel Macron’s participation in it. He said France can no longer be an honest broker in Armenian-Azerbaijani peace talks because of pro-Armenian statements made by Macron and French lawmakers.
The Armenian Foreign Ministry responded by saying that when Aliyev and Pashinian met in Prague on October 6 in the presence of Macron and EU chief Charles Michel they agreed that the French leader will also attend their meeting in Brussels.
“We continue to adhere to [that agreement] and again express readiness to arrange a meeting of the PM of Armenia, Presidents of Azerbaijan, France and [the European Council President] within an acceptable time frame,” Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan tweeted on Monday.
The EU source told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service that European officials remain in touch with Baku and Yerevan in an effort to arrange the planned Aliyev-Pashinian talks. Their holding is “important” for Michel, said the source.
Toivo Klaar, the EU’s special representative in the South Caucasus, visited Baku and met with Aliyev late last week. He tweeted afterwards that the Azerbaijani leader remains committed to the “EU-facilitated format” of peace talks.
Klaar urged Armenia and Azerbaijan to show “strong political will” to end their long-running conflict.
Philip Reeker, a senior U.S. diplomat and co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group, visited the Azerbaijani capital on Monday. Reeker reportedly called on the conflicting sides to “plan further negotiations.”
The most recent Armenian-Azerbaijani summit was hosted by Russian President Vladimir Putin in Sochi on October 31.
In a joint statement with Putin issued there, Aliyev and Pashinian pledged to “actively” work on the bilateral peace treaty and “refrain from the use of force or the threat of its use.” But they traded fresh accusations in the following weeks.