Armenia considers it necessary to engage an international fact-finding mission in the Nagorno-Karabakh settlement and hopes that Russia will assist, Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan said on Monday

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik – 20th March, 2023) Armenia considers it necessary to engage an international fact-finding mission in the Nagorno-Karabakh settlement and hopes that Russia will assist, Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan said on Monday.

"Without any diminishing of the role of our Russian partners in the process of establishing a ceasefire in 2020, as well as the role of the Russian peacekeeping contingent … the current situation demonstrates the need for mechanisms to guarantee the rights and security of the population of Nagorno-Karabakh and international involvement in them. It is necessary to involve international mechanisms for the prevention of genocide, to send an international fact-finding mission to the Lachin corridor and Nagorno-Karabakh. We hope for cooperation with the Russian side on this issue," Mirzoyan said at a joint press conference after a meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in Moscow.

Lavrov, in turn, expressed appreciation for Armenia's resolve on deployment of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) mission to the Armenian-Azerbaijani border amid rising tensions over the blocked Lachin corridor.

"I would like to express satisfaction with what Ararat Samveli (Mirzoyan) just said, specifically that Armenia has not refused to sign the decision on the CSTO mission deployment," the top Russian diplomat said.

Since December 12, 2022, the Lachin corridor, which runs through the Lachin district of Azerbaijan to link Armenia with the Nagorno-Karabakh enclave, has been blocked by a group of people from Azerbaijan described by Baku as environmental activists protesting alleged Armenian illegal mining in the area.

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has repeatedly said that the corridor's blockade violates the ceasefire declaration brokered by Russia between Armenia and Azerbaijan in 2020. The document delegated control of the Lachin corridor to Russian peacekeepers deployed in Nagorno-Karabakh. In late December 2022, Pashinyan alleged that the peacekeepers did not fulfill their obligations, a claim that was dismissed by Moscow.

https://www.urdupoint.com/en/world/armenia-calls-for-involving-intl-mission-in-1662496.html