“Zhamanak” quotes Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov as saying on Wednesday that Moscow expects progress in Armenian-Azerbaijani peace talks in 2019. “Lavrov did not specify what form of progress he imagines,” writes the paper. “Instead, he said that Baku’s readiness for a settlement needs to be assisted and that he hopes that Yerevan will reciprocate.” The paper is worried that Moscow expects the Armenian side to make territorial concessions to Azerbaijan and get “nothing” in return. It is confident that Nikol Pashinian would not agree to “Lavrov’s plan.”
“Zhoghovurd” says that Armenian-Azerbaijani talks have continued intensively since the “velvet revolution” in Armenia despite the fact that Pashinian and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev have not officially met yet. The foreign ministers of the two countries met in Paris on Wednesday for the fourth time in six months. According to the U.S., Russian and French co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk, Group, Zohrab Mnatsakanian and Elmar Mammadyarov agreed on the need to prepare Armenians and Azerbaijanis for peace. The paper says that neither the Armenian nor the Azerbaijani government has done that until now. “Instead, Azerbaijan has for years disseminated Armenophobia,” it says.
“Aravot” disagrees with those critics of the current Armenian government who draw parallels between Pashinian’s My Step bloc and Serzh Sarkisian’s Republican Party (HHK). “If you can afford a car but choose to demonstratively ride in a trolley you are a hypocrite,” writes the paper. “But if you build huge mansions whose rooms you have trouble finding or move around in a motorcade of four or five cars that is unacceptable.” It says there was nothing wrong with Pashinian’s decision to organize a dinner party at a restaurant outside Yerevan for the newly elected parliamentarians representing My Step.
(Sargis Harutyunyan)
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