Lavrov: We expect the Nagorno Karabakh negotiating process to resume as soon as possible

The Armenian-Azerbaijani border conflict of July 12-16 became the second largest violation since April 2016 of the 1994 Ceasefire Agreement, drafted with Russia’s mediation, “ Russian ForeignMinister Sergey Lavrov has told True newspaper in an interview.

 

“This is the first time in 26 years that we are seeing highly intensive clashes involving field artillery, mortars and strike drones directly on the state border between Armenia and Azerbaijan, rather than along the line of contact in Karabakh,” the minister has noted, as quoted by the Russian ministry of of foreign affairs.

 

In Lavrov words, to stabilise the situation, the Russian Foreign Ministry urged the conflicting parties to immediately cease fire on July 13, then he had telephone conversations with my colleagues from Armenia and Azerbaijan and met with representatives of organisations uniting Russian citizens with Azerbaijani and Armenian backgrounds. “Both diasporas should be fully aware of their responsibility for complying with the Russian Federation’s laws and for fostering an atmosphere conducive to the normalisation of relations between Baku and Yerevan,” said Lavrov.

 

“The situation became more or less stabilised in August and remains relatively calm on the border and the line of contact. Mutual public accusations are subsiding. We expect the negotiating process on the Nagorno-Karabakh settlement to resume as soon as possible. We are working on this with our partners from the OSCE Minsk Group,” added the minister.