- Armenia and Azerbaijan agreed not to use force to resolve Nagorno-Karabakh, in a joint statement after Russian-mediated talks.
- They agreed to settle disputes based on mutual recognition of sovereignty and territorial integrity.
- The initiative comes a month after the worst clashes between Armenia and Azerbaijan since their 2020 war.
- They fought wars in the 1990s and 2020; the 2020 war killed more than 6,500 troops and led to Russian-brokered territorial concessions.
- Last month's clashes killed 286 people; hostilities ended with a US-brokered ceasefire, while the US and EU now lead mediation amid Russian isolation.
Rivals Armenia and Azerbaijan on Monday “agreed not to use force” to resolve their dispute over the Nagorno-Karabakh territory, in a joint statement after Russian-mediated talks.
Baku and Yerevan also agreed “to settle all disputes solely on the basis of the recognition of mutual sovereignty and territorial integration”, they said in a joint declaration adopted at the end of the Sochi summit.
The initiative comes a month after the worst clashes between Armenia and Azerbaijan since their war in 2020.
Armenia and Azerbaijan have fought two wars — in 2020 and in the 1990s — over Azerbaijan’s Armenian populated region of Nagorno-Karabakh.
A six-week war in autumn 2020, which claimed the lives of more than 6,500 troops on both sides, ended with a Russian-brokered deal that saw Yerevan cede swathes of territory that it had controlled for several decades.
Last month, 286 people from both sides were killed in clashes that have jeopardised a slow and halting peace process.
The hostilities ended with a US-brokered ceasefire, after earlier failed attempts by Russia to negotiate a truce.
With Moscow increasingly isolated on the world stage following its February offensive on Ukraine, the US and the EU have taken a leading role in mediating the Armenia-Azerbaijan peace talks.
