This content was published on 15 December 2021 – 17:18
Moscow, Dec 15 (EFE) .- Moscow celebrates the willingness of Ankara and Yerevan to normalize relations and will support this process “by all means”, declared today the spokeswoman for the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zajárova.
“We welcome the willingness shown in recent times by Ankara and Yerevan to initiate a bilateral dialogue to discuss the normalization of relations. For our part we are ready to cooperate by all means with this process,” he said at a press conference.
According to the representative of the Russian diplomacy, “the normalization of the Armenian-Turkish relations would help to heal the general situation in the region, and to create a healthy atmosphere of trust and good neighborliness in the region.”
“The appointment of official representatives is a logical and rational step to develop these aspirations,” he added.
Armenia announced on Tuesday its willingness to normalize its relations with Turkey without preconditions and indicated that it will appoint a special representative for dialogue with Ankara, a day after the Turkish government reported that it will take the first steps to normalize relations with Armenia.
Ankara announced the forthcoming appointment of official representatives and the reestablishment of direct flights between the two countries, after three decades of border closures and no embassies opening.
Turkey has not maintained diplomatic relations with its neighbor since Armenia, newly independent from the Soviet Union, occupied Azerbaijani territory in the 1993 Nagorno-Karabakh war.
Since then, the border between the two countries has been closed and political tensions remain, exacerbated by Turkey’s refusal to recognize as “genocide” the massacres of Armenians committed by Turkish forces in 1915, in the last years of the Ottoman Empire.
Although in 2009 Armenia and Turkey signed an agreement to reestablish relations and open their borders, it was never ratified.
In addition, Turkey is the great ally of Azerbaijan in its conflict with Armenia over Nagorno Karabakh, which was part of the Soviet Republic of Azerbaijan despite being predominantly populated by Armenians.
Turkish-made combat drones were decisive in the 2020 war, in which in 44 days Azerbaijan regained large tracts of its territory that had been under Armenian control for almost 30 years. EFE
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