Latvian Foreign Minister Edgars Rinkēvičs on Monday, May 23 urged the European Union to start an associations program with Armenia and Azerbaijan.

Rinkēvičs took part in the 7th Meeting of Eastern Partnership Foreign Ministers, with foreign policy chiefs of EU member States and the Eastern Partnership countries also participating.

Addressing the Brussels-hosted meeting, he called on his EU counterparts not to forget about the six countries included in the bloc's Eastern Partnership program, Lsm.lv reports.

It is now a year since Riga hosted a major Eastern Partnership summit as part of its presidency of the EU and while the Riga Summit was generally judged to be a disappointment in terms of tangible results, Rinkēvičs is still keen to bang the drum for the initiative which is supposed to act as a guide for relations between the EU and Belarus, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Moldova, Ukraine and Georgia.

Rinkēvičs cited "implementation of agreements on the deep and comprehensive free trade area, visa liberalization, and closer sectoral cooperation" as "the correct and necessary steps that the EU must take."

Rinkēvičs urged Belarus to establish a moratorium on the death penalty and said negotiations should be started on new agreements with Azerbaijan and Armenia.