Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev have met on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference, in their first direct talks in over seven months.
Saturday’s meeting was mediated by German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who met with both Pashinyan and Aliyev individually beforehand. All three meetings were focused on the peace talks between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
In a post on X, Scholz said that Germany and Europe were ready to support the peace negotiations ‘to the best of their ability’.
‘It’s good that both sides have agreed to resolve open issues without new violence’, he added.
The German Chancellor also commended Armenia for withdrawing its bid to host the COP29 climate summit next year in favour of Azerbaijan, a move he said created ‘favourable opportunities and conditions for advancing the peace agenda’.
Azerbaijan’s Presidential Administration stated that Aliyev and Pashinyan also met one-on-one. While Yerevan has yet to confirm this, APA reported that the meeting took place immediately after the end of the trilateral talks with Scholz and only lasted around 10 minutes.
The meeting took place a week after an escalation of tensions between Armenia and Azerbaijan, which resulted in the death of four Armenian soldiers in an Azerbaijani ‘revenge operation’ on the border.
Also last week, Pashinyan warned that Azerbaijan could be stalling peace talks in order to launch a ‘full-scale war’, a claim Azerbaijan dismissed as ‘unfounded’.
However, statements made by Pashinyan and Aliyev suggested that the trilateral meeting mediated by Scholz was constructive.
The following day, Pashinyan met with members of the Armenian diaspora in Munich, where he said that the trilateral meeting aimed to ensure that Armenia and Azerbaijan remained faithful to the agreements they had already reached.
The prime minister said that Armenia’s and Azerbaijan’s foreign ministers were set to meet ‘in the near future’ to agree on the text of the peace treaty. He added that the two countries would undertake a new round of border demarcation talks after the foreign ministers’ meetings.
NATO’s Special Representative for the Caucasus and Central Asia, Javier Colomina, praised the meeting, adding that the bloc ‘strongly supports’ the normalisation of relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
Very important indeed to see #Armenia and #Azerbaijan meeting again at the highest level and agreeing on the need to continue the talks towards a long lasting peace treaty. #NATO strongly supports the normalisation of relations between 🇦🇲 and 🇦🇿 https://t.co/p9zHREtY7F
— Javier Colomina (@JavierColominaP) February 18, 2024
Pashinyan and Aliyev last met face-to-face in Brussels in July 2023 in a meeting mediated by EU Council President Charles Michel.
The two leaders were scheduled to meet in October 2023 in Granada, but Aliyev cancelled the meeting amid Azerbaijani media reports that he had done so in protest against France’s offer of military supplies to Armenia.