YEREVAN, April 6. /TASS/. Armenia’s President Armen Sarkissian held talks with United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Amman on Saturday, the Armenian president’s press service said.
The talks focused on the summit meeting held by Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev on March 29 in Vienna.
"Armenia’s president underscored the importance of UN support to the OSCE Minsk Group as the only mission internationally authorized to find a solution to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict," the presidential press service said. "Sarkissian and the UN Secretary General hailed the summit meeting between Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev and pointed out that there was no other option but a peaceful solution to the conflict."
Sarkissian and Guterres exchanged views on future cooperation within the United Nations and its agencies.
Armenia’s Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev held the first official meeting in Vienna on March 29, seeking peace for Nagorno-Karabakh.
History of Nagorno-Karabakh conflict
The highland region of Nagorno-Karabakh (Mountainous Karabakh) is a mostly Armenian-populated enclave inside the sovereign territory of Azerbaijan. It was the first zone of inter-ethnic tensions and violence to appear on the map of the former USSR in February 1988. Then, the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Region declared independence from Azerbaijan, a republic within the Soviet Union at the time. In 1992-1994, hostilities broke out in the region between pro-Baku forces and Armenian residents, which resulted in the Nagorno-Karabakh’s de facto independence. In 1994, a ceasefire was reached but the relations between Azerbaijan and Armenia have been strained since then.
Since 1992, the Minsk Group of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) co-chaired by Russia, France and the US have been holding talks to find a peaceful solution to the conflict.