YEREVAN — Armenian Parliament Speaker Alen Simonyan has stated that an Armenian delegate should not attend the UN climate change conference in Baku later this month unless Azerbaijan returns Armenian prisoners of war (POWs) and other detainees.
Simonyan made his remarks on Monday when asked by the media about Armenia’s response to the invitation to the November 11-22 conference, known as COP29. Baku had officially extended the invitation to Armenia’s foreign minister.
“I don’t think we should hesitate to take steps when there is an opportunity to return prisoners. But we will live and see,” he said.
Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan indicated in parliament last week that Yerevan has not yet made a decision regarding its participation in COP29.
Some media reports suggest that Mirzoyan may consider attending the conference if Azerbaijan agrees to return Armenian detainees to Yerevan.
According to official data, 23 ethnic Armenians are currently detained in Azerbaijan. Eight of these individuals are former military and political leaders of Nagorno-Karabakh, who were arrested last fall when Azerbaijan occupied the region, leading to the exodus of more than 120,000 people – virtually the entire ethnic Armenian population of the region – to Armenia.
YEREVAN -- Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan received a delegation led by Seyed Hamid Pourmohammadi, vice…
YEREVAN -- The Constitutional Court has begun examining the applications filed by seven political forces…
YEREVAN -- At a meeting of the Civil Contract Party’s board on June 25, Ruben…
MOSCOW -- A decision on suspending Armenia’s membership in the Collective Security Treaty Organization or…
BAKU -- “The EU will continue to support the peace process between Armenia and Azerbaijan,”…
MOSCOW -- Commonwealth of Independent States Secretary General Sergey Lebedev expressed the view that the…