Long-running efforts to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict will gain new momentum next year, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said on Friday.
“The year 2019 will give a new impetus to the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict settlement process,” Aliyev wrote on his Twitter page. He did not elaborate.
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian tweeted about two hours later that a Karabakh settlement “remains a top priority” for Armenia. “We will continue with the peace process for the benefit of regional peace & security,” he said. “Resolution requires genuine efforts of all parties.”
Pashinian and Aliyev spoke to each other on December 6 at a summit of ex-Soviet states held in the Russian city of Saint Petersburg. A senior aide to Aliyev said they discussed “the continuation of active negotiations” on a Karabakh peace.
The conversation came the day after the Armenian and Azerbaijani foreign ministers held fresh negotiations in Milan in the presence of the U.S., Russian and French mediators co-chairing the OSCE Minsk Group. Both ministers described the talks as “useful.”
In a joint statement issued after the Milan talks, the co-chairs expressed hope that “an intensive results-oriented high-level dialogue between the leaders of Azerbaijan and Armenia” will resume “in the near future.”
Pashinian, who came to power in May, also briefly talked to Aliyev at the previous CIS summit held in Tajikistan in September. There has been a significant decrease in ceasefire violations along “the line of contact” around Karabakh and the Armenian-Azerbaijani border since then, according to the conflicting parties.
Speaking in Baku on Thursday, Aliyev said that there are now “more favorable” conditions for ending the bitter conflict.
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