Interfax, Russia
April 29 2009
Armenia, Turkey have real chance to normalize relations – Russian
ministry
MOSCOW April 29
The authorities in Moscow welcome the efforts made by Yerevan and
Ankara to normalize their relations, Russian Foreign Ministry
spokesman Andrei Nesterenko told a news conference on Wednesday.
"It offers a real chance to change the status quo and to transfer
their long-frozen relations to a new constructive dimension,"
Nesterenko said.
"These agreements are a bilateral affair of Armenia and Turkey," the
spokesman said.
"As a partly Caucasus country, we welcome any initiatives of Yerevan
and Ankara that will lead to a normalization between the two states
and help ease tensions in the region as a whole," he said.
"Moscow sincerely wishes its Armenian and Turkish partners success,"
he said.
Nesterenko said he hopes that "this positive dynamics in Armenian-
Turkish relations will benefit the atmosphere of negotiations on the
Nagorno-Karabakh settlement process." tm rp