Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan made a statement following the meeting with the Italian Foreign Minister.

“Armenia attaches great importance to the continued development of bilateral relations with Italy based on rich traditions, common values and democratic principles. 

During today’s discussions, we expressed mutual satisfaction with the high level of political dialogue between Armenia and Italy and the positive dynamics of mutual visits at a high level.

Today we have touched in detail on the issues of international and regional security and stability. I presented the situation created as a result of the invasion of the Azerbaijani armed forces in the village of Parukh of Nagorno-Karabakh, periodic violations of the ceasefire regime in the conflict zone, steps to create a humanitarian crisis in Artsakh, Azerbaijan’s policy of ethnic cleansing in Nagorno-Karabakh and other manifestations. 

I think that the international community should give a proper and targeted response to these actions of the Azerbaijani side and contribute to efforts to establish peace in the South Caucasus. And in this regard, I want to note that the OSCE Minsk Group co-chair countries have already clearly and specifically responded to the latest aggravation of the situation in Nagorno-Karabakh, stating that this is a consequence of the movement of Azerbaijani troops.

I reaffirmed Armenia’s readiness to continue peace negotiations and, as a result, conclude a peace treaty under the mandate and within the framework of the OSCE Minsk Group Co-chairmanship. I informed that Azerbaijan had given us proposals that we considered acceptable, but incomplete, and supplemented them with our proposals and expressed our readiness to immediately start negotiations based on these principles. 

We also touched upon the humanitarian problems that have arisen after the 44-day war and are still unresolved, and first of all, of course, the need for the immediate release of Armenian POWs, and we highly appreciate the resolution adopted in March last year by the Italian Parliament in this regard,” the statement reads.