The Russian President: Russian peacekeeping forces will be the mediator in the discussions between Azerbaijan and the Armenian separatists
Russian President Vladimir Putin announced on Wednesday that Moscow’s peacekeeping forces will be the mediator in the talks scheduled for Thursday between Azerbaijan and Armenian separatists in the Nagorno-Karabakh region.
The Kremlin said in a statement that Putin informed Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan in a telephone call that these negotiations will be conducted through the mediation of the Russian peacekeeping leadership” deployed in the region.
The discussions come after a military operation launched by Baku forces on Tuesday, which ended on Wednesday with the conclusion of a ceasefire agreement after the separatists surrendered.
On Wednesday, Putin expressed his hope that the situation in the Azerbaijani Nagorno-Karabakh region would take a peaceful path.
Speaking during a meeting with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in the Russian city of St. Petersburg, Putin said that his country is in close contact with all sides.
He added: “We’re in very close contact with all sides to the conflict and the authorities in Yerevan, Stepanakert, and Baku, and I hope that we can achieve a halt to the escalation and move the solution to this problem to a peaceful path”.
Earlier Wednesday, the Azerbaijani Ministry of Defense announced that representatives of the Armenian population in Karabakh submitted a request through the Russian peace force, according to which an agreement was reached for Baku to stop its operation against terrorism in the region, and to evacuate the illegal Armenian armed groups and the Armenian armed forces present in the region, disarm, evacuate its military sites, and disarm it completely.
