One noteworthy circumstance took place last year in April. The first side to reveal the fact that Lavrov would participate in the upcoming meeting in Moscow was official Baku. The Minister of Foreign Affairs of Azerbaijan, Elmar Mammedyarov, said, “Soon (we have already made a decision), we will announce a meeting between the ministers of foreign affairs of Azerbaijan and Armenia and the co-chairs. I believe that Sergey Lavrov will also participate.” He also mentioned the importance of reaching the first phase of the conflict resolution. “The overall understanding is that there needs to be movement in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict resolution process. Otherwise, it is already impossible,” the Azerbaijani minister of foreign affairs said. According to Mammedyarov, he spoke to his Russian colleague, Sergey Lavrov, in Moscow (during the summit for foreign affairs ministers from CIS nations) about the two countries’ mutual relations and the conflict resolution.
It was already obvious that the Russian side is not only “holding the trigger” on the Artsakh conflict resolution process, but it has also taken on the responsibility of controlling the negotiations process. This is a beneficial situation for Baku since Russian activity is not only based on organizing meetings and making announcements. Statements made by official Moscow over the past year or so have allowed us to make the conclusion that the Russian side truly expects obvious results to come from the Artsakh conflict resolution process.
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Emma Gabrielyan
“Aravot” daily
22.04.2020
