MOSCOW — Russian President Vladimir Putin, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev announced in Moscow on Monday the signing of a joint statement aimed at developing the region.
In the statement issued after the meeting that lasted for about four hours, they said the Russian, Armenian and Azerbaijani governments will set up a joint “working group” that will deal with practical modalities of restoring transport links between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
According to the statement, the group will submit by March 1 a timetable of “measures envisaging the restoration and construction of new transport infrastructure facilities” in line with the November 9 ceasefire deal. The group is to comprise teams of experts who will calculate the cost of these projects.
“I consider today’s meeting extremely important and useful, because we were able to agree on and signed a joint statement on the development of the situation in the region. I mean concrete steps to build economic ties, develop infrastructure projects. For this purpose, a working group will be created, headed by vice-prime ministers of Azerbaijan, Armenia and Russia,” Putin said at a press briefing following the trilateral meeting.
According to him, they will set up working expert subgroups in the near future, present concrete plans for the development of transport infrastructure and the region’s economy.
“I am sure that the implementation of these agreements will benefit both the Armenian and Azerbaijani people, and without any doubt, will benefit the region as a whole, and hence the interests of the Russian Federation,” Putin said.
He noted that the Russian peacekeeping group fully fulfills its obligations to both sides.
“As I said at the beginning of our meeting today, over 48 thousand displaced persons and refugees have already returned to Nagorno-Karabakh. Persistent work is underway to restore infrastructure, energy, housing, social infrastructure,” Putin said.
The full text of the statement states:
“We, President of the Republic of Azerbaijan I. H. Aliyev, Prime Minister of the Republic of Armenia N. V. Pashinyan and President of the Russian Federation V. V. Putin declare the following:
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