Armenian, Azerbaijan Foreign Ministers attending NATO partner summit

PanARMENIAN.Net - The foreign ministers of Armenia and Azerbaijan, Ararat Mirzoyan and Jeyhun Bayramov, have arrived in Washington to participate in the summit along with representatives of other NATO partner states.

The U.S. State Department acknowledged last week that it hopes to organize fresh talks between them during the summit slated for July 9-10.

The Armenian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, Ani Badalian, said Monday, July 8 that bilateral meetings have been scheduled, though she told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service later in the day that no such meeting with Bayramov has been scheduled so far.

Speaking in Baku on Monday, Bayramov continued to reiterate that the signing of an Armenian-Azerbaijani peace treaty is conditional on Armenia changing its constitution.

“There are still territorial claims against Azerbaijan in the constitution of Armenia,” he said. “We expect that the Armenian side will take steps in that direction. In order to achieve complete peace, this factor must be eliminated.”

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev indicated late last month that even if Yerevan meets this condition Baku will not be in a rush to sign the peace accord. Aliyev suggested that the two sides first work out the basic principles of the accord and sign the whole document at a later date.

Tigran Grigorian, a Yerevan-based political analyst, said such an arrangement would enable Baku to continue to put military pressure on Armenia and avoid recognizing its borders.

“Overall, it’s clear that Baku is not interested in Western-mediated negotiations,” Grigorian told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service. “Azerbaijan has not set itself the goal of signing a peace agreement during a certain period.”

The two ministers, he said, are therefore unlikely to make decisive progress towards the peace deal even if they do meet in Washington.