Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said on Thursday that such a meeting could lay the groundwork for a new format of regional cooperation. Armenia is “not prepared for it,” Aliyev said during the World Economic Forum in Davos.
“The Armenian side has expressed readiness and is still ready for such a meeting,” Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan told the Armenpress news agency. “But it’s obvious that such a meeting does not seem particularly effective and promising now that it is not possible to agree on even a simple joint statement expressing commitment to the elimination of hate speech and hostility.”
Mirzoyan appeared to allude to a joint declaration that would be adopted at the proposed summit. He did not specify what exactly Yerevan and Baku disagree on. The Armenian Foreign Ministry declined to comment.
Aliyev revealed the idea of the summit amid a lack of progress in Armenian-Azerbaijani negotiations on a bilateral peace treaty. He accused Armenia of torpedoing further peace talks.
Mirzoyan and Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov were due to hold a trilateral meeting with their Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov in Moscow on December 23. Yerevan cancelled the meeting because of Baku’s blockade of Nagorno-Karabakh’s land link with Armenia.
Bayramov expressed hope on Friday that he cancelled meeting will take place “as early as possible.”
In this regard, Mirzoyan said that the Armenian side is still awaiting the Azerbaijani response to its most recent proposals regarding the peace treaty. He also reaffirmed Yerevan’s reluctance to negotiate with Baku over the reopening of the Lachin corridor blocked by Azerbaijani government-backed protesters on December 12.
“Ensuring the normal operation of the corridor is the responsibility of Azerbaijan and peacekeeping troops of the Russian Federation,” he said.