Yerevan Denies Any Discussions for Armenia-Turkey Border Demarcation

YEREVAN — Armenia on Monday denied Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu’s claims that Ankara and Yerevan have agreed to re-demarcate their closed border.

Cavusoglu said over the weekend that the issue will be on the agenda of the next round of Turkish-Armenian normalization talks which will be held in Vienna on Tuesday. Turkish and Armenian negotiators will discuss practical modalities of the demarcation process, he said, adding that the two neighboring states may set up a bilateral commission for that purpose.

“There have been no discussions or agreements between Armenia and Turkey regarding the border re-demarcation,” said Vahan Hunanyan, the Armenian Foreign Ministry spokesman.

“There is no such issue on the agenda,” Hunanyan added in written comments.

Cavusoglu said last month that sections of the Turkish-Armenian border marked by the Arax river need to be demarcated again because over the past few decades the river has changed its course as a result of floods.

Ruben Galchyan, an Armenian cartographer, insisted on Monday that the changes cited by Cavusoglu are insignificant. He suggested that Ankara simply hopes to use a re-demarcation process to get Yerevan to formally and explicitly recognize the existing frontier.

“I think that those minor border changes are simply a pretext [for the Turks,]” Galchyan told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service.