Deputy Foreign Minister Paruyr Hovhannisyan touched upon the agreement on the Armenian-Azerbaijani peace agreement and, despite this, Azerbaijan’s rhetoric, noting that this is not a new style of work.

“We have had a step forward before, but there were complications and provocations; sometimes two steps back were observed,” he said. According to the deputy minister, 58 countries and 10 international organizations welcomed the final agreement, emphasizing the role of Armenia.

He reminded us that Armenia continues to advance the peace agenda and work with international partners in this direction.

When asked what would happen if the observers were withdrawn from the border, he noted: “There is no need to discuss that scenario. As you mentioned, the treaty is not moving that fast; there is a question of signing and ratifying the treaty. The mandate of the observers is for two years. Of course, in the future, if we have that progress, sign, ratify, and there are signs of truly stable peace, we can discuss a new mandate for the EU observers; it is not necessary to be limited only to the border. The mandate also includes the creation of confidence-building measures,” he said.

According to Hovhannisyan, even in the most positive scenario, we will be able to find the right model to continue cooperating with the EU observers in the future.

And is Yerevan sure that Baku will not demand that they be removed from Armenia altogether? He said, “We cannot have complete confidence in anything. However, when discussing third-party forces, are the EU observers a force? This is an observation mission.”