The foreign minister has reiterated Armenia’s view that rapprochement with Turkey in no way depends on the Karabakh conflict with Azerbaijan.
“Armenia’s position remains unchanged: Armenian-Turkish normalization is not related to the Karabakh settlement,” Foreign MinisterEdward Nalbandian said during “government hour” in the National Assembly of Armenia yesterday.
“We started negotiations with Turkey and signed the protocols, which do not contain a single word about the Karabakh settlement. The mediating countries hold the same view. These issues are not linked and cannot be linked to each other,” Nalbandian said.
If Turkey now sets preconditions for ratification of the protocols, this is the business of the Turkish government which must bear the consequences, the minister said.
The protocols were signed in Zurich on 10 October 2009 by the foreign ministers of Armenia and Turkey. The first protocol covers the opening of the Armenian-Turkish border and the normalization of relations, while the second envisages the establishment of a joint historical commission to investigate the events of 1915 in Ottoman Turkey.
Turkish officials have said on many occasions that ratification of the protocols depends on progress in finding a settlement to the Karabakh conflict.
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