Armenia’s Pashinyan, France’s Macron Discuss Security in South Caucasus, Cooperation
France’s President Emmanuel Macron addresses the APEC CEO Summit during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Summit in Bangkok on November 18, 2022.
MOSCOW (Sputnik) – Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and French President Emmanuel Macron have discussed the issues of strengthening security in the South Caucasus and further development of bilateral cooperation, the prime minister’s office said on Saturday.Pashinyan is paying a working visit to Tunisia from November 18-19 to attend the 18th summit of the International Organization of the Francophonie in Djerba.”Nikol Pashinyan and Emmanuel Macron also exchanged ideas on the results of the quadrilateral meeting of the leaders of Armenia, France, Azerbaijan and the President of the European Council held in Prague in October this year. Implementation of steps aimed at strengthening stability and security in the South Caucasus was emphasized,” the statement read.The statement also said that the sides had discussed issues related to the further development of the Armenian-French bilateral cooperation.The long-standing conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh flared up in September 2020, marking the worst escalation since the 1990s. Hostilities ended with a Russia-brokered trilateral declaration of ceasefire signed in November 2020. The two former Soviet countries agreed to the deployment of Russian peacekeepers in the conflict-torn region as they started negotiating the border delimitation.In May 2022, Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev instructed their foreign ministries to begin preparations for peace talks between Yerevan and Baku. However, the negotiations were disrupted by hostilities breaking out between Armenia and Azerbaijan overnight on September 12-13, in an area unrelated to Nagorno-Karabakh. Both countries agreed to a ceasefire by the morning of September 13, which failed overnight. Another ceasefire went into effect on September 14.
