They were joined by their Kazakh counterpart Murat Nurtleu at the opening session of the talks held in Kazakhstan’s largest city, Almaty.
In his opening remarks, Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov expressed confidence that he and Armenia’s Ararat Mirzoyan “will work productively in the next two days to find solutions to outstanding issues.”
Bayramov also stressed the importance of a controversial April 19 agreement that commits Armenia to ceding several key border areas to Azerbaijan. The planned land handover, portrayed by the two sides as the start of the Armenian-Azerbaijan border delimitation, has sparked angry street protests against Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian.
Mirzoyan noted, for his part, that the agreement says the delimitation process must be based on a 1991 declaration signed by Armenia, Azerbaijan and other newly independent ex-Soviet republics in Almaty (then Alma-Ata). They pledged to recognize each other’s Soviet-era borders.
“It is important to note that over the past two years, both the prime minister of Armenia and the president of Azerbaijan have repeatedly reaffirmed their commitment to the Alma-Ata Declaration in various formats,” said Mirzoyan.
Aliyev have made no public statements to that effect so far, however. Mirzoyan himself has repeatedly complained in recent months that Baku remains reluctant to recognize Armenia’s borders through the bilateral peace treaty. In his words, this is the main hurdle to the signing of the accord.
Another apparent sticking point is continuing Azerbaijani demands for an extraterritorial corridor that would connect to Azerbaijan to its Nakhichevan exclave through a strategic Armenian region. Aliyev reiterated those demands last month. He also said that Armenia must change its constitution if it wants to sign the peace deal.