US Reiterates the Need for Opening of Lachin Corridor for Commercial and Private Vehicles

WASHINGTON, DC — The United States put forward a number of proposals to Armenia and Azerbaijan during their foreign ministerial talks in Washington in early May, a senior State Department official has said.

“The peace process is moving forward. The secretary hosted the two foreign ministers in early May to work through some of the most contentious issues including, for example, the distancing of forces along the border, dispute resolution mechanism in the treaty that we are trying to facilitate agreement on, the rights and security of the ethnic Armenians in Nagorno Karabagh. These are a lot of the issues that we were working through,” Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs at the U.S. State Department Dereck Hogan said at a Subcommittee Hearing in the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

He added that the U.S. has offered proposals to Armenia and Azerbaijan.

“We put forward a number of proposals that gave the two sides perhaps some bridging language there. So they’ve been taking that back and studying it. “Since than we have been working very closely with the European Union. EU Council President Charles Michel hosted the two leaders in Brussels a couple of weeks after we hosted the foreign Ministers. And they will be meeting again with the Chancellor of Germany, the President of France and the President of the EU Council to focus once again on what needs to be done to actually get this along the finish line,” Mr. Hogan noted.

“When it comes to the Lachin corridor, it’s something that the Secretary has been pushing very hard on, particularly when it comes to the opening of the corridor for commercial and private vehicles,” he said.