The presidents of Azerbaijan and Armenia spoke today, Thursday, about progress toward ending their decades-long conflict, following a verbal altercation between them in the presence of Russian President Vladimir Putin. During a meeting held in Moscow, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan accused Azerbaijan of causing a humanitarian crisis by closing the only land route connecting Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh. He described this as a "direct violation of the ceasefire agreement reached in 2020," which ended a six-week war between the two countries, and called for an international mission to assess the situation.
Azerbaijan maintains that it closed the route because "Armenia was using it to send weapons to Nagorno-Karabakh," a claim that Armenia denies. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev responded to Pashinyan by saying, "Azerbaijan has not closed any corridor, and there is no need to use this platform to make unfounded accusations."
The two presidents continued to argue for several minutes until Putin intervened to end the conversation during the meeting, as he once again seeks to mediate an agreement between the parties. Despite the heated exchange between them, both Pashinyan and Aliyev stated that "recent times have seen progress toward a settlement based on mutual recognition of each other's territorial integrity."
