ARMINFO News Agency, Armenia Friday Ashotyan: From the point of view of promotion of foreign policy interests, 2017 was successful for Armenia Yerevan December 22 Mariana Mkrtchyan. From the standpoint of promoting foreign policy interests, the year 2017 was successful for Armenia. On December 22, in Yerevan, summing up the results of the year, stated the head of the parliamentary commission on foreign affairs of the National Assembly of Armenia Armen Ashotyan. In his opinion, in 2017 Armenia significantly strengthened its positions in the sphere of security. "Moreover, after the signing of the comprehensive and expanded partnership agreement, Armenia-EU relations have entered a new stage, I believe that relations with the EU will be synchronized with the internal political agenda of Armenia next year." I believe that 2018 is not unique or imposed from the EU. will be the year of the parade of ratification of documents by the European Union member states, "Ashotyan said. And in this context, he added that the agreement contains transitional items, including the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, which states that the conflict should be resolved exclusively within the framework of the OSCE Minsk Group and through peaceful negotiations, taking into account the right of peoples to self-determination. According to him, these important principles and the ratification by the parliaments of the European countries of this document will support these principles. In this context, the Armenian parliamentarian touched upon the situation in the Karabakh conflict zone and stressed that the first half of the year was not as favorable as the second one in terms of provocations, private violations of the ceasefire regime, incidents, and a periodic increase in the degree of tension. At the same time, he stressed that he had little optimism about maintaining stability in the conflict zone. "After the Geneva meeting, the situation in the conflict zone has stabilized more or less, but this is not due to the fact that there are mechanisms of trust in the conflict zone, which is due to the goodwill of the military and political leadership of Azerbaijan, but there are no guarantees that tomorrow this situation will not change.In this regard, I believe it is important to introduce mechanisms of trust on the contact line and increase the mandate of the office of the Personal Representative of the OSCE Chairman-in-Office," Ashotyan said. At the same time, another achievement of 2017, the Armenian parliamentarian called the strengthening of relations with China, with neighboring Iran, the achievement of progress in relations with Israel. Speaking about the Armenian-Turkish relations, Ashotyan recalled that in 2018 the Armenian-Turkish protocols signed in 2009 in Zurich will be removed from the agenda. He added that it is no secret to anyone whose fault these protocols remained on paper. "Today Ankara is trying to save its own face, however these attempts are vain," he said. In general, he noted that the year 2017 was successful in terms of parliamentary diplomacy, and Armenia in the international arena defended both its own interests and promoted the interests of Artsakh.