YEREVAN, MARCH 15, ARMENPRESS. Armenia hasn’t received any proposal from Turkey on normalization of relations without any preconditions, Deputy Foreign Minister of Armenia Shavarsh Kocharyan told the reporters answering the question if there have been any developments in the relations with Turkey following Armenia’s declaration of the Zurich protocols null and void.

“Following the withdrawal of the protocols first the instruction of the President was implemented which was about informing the Turkish side about Armenia’s decision. At the same time I would like to remind that the Armenian side has announced that it’s always ready for negotiations to normalize the relations, but without preconditions. In this regard we have not received any proposal from Turkey”, ARMENPRESS reports Kocharyan saying.

During his speech at the 72nd session of the UN General Assembly on September 20 2017, Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan announced that Armenia will declare the two Protocols null and void since they continuously lacked any positive progress towards their implementation, and will enter the spring of 2018 without those, as the experience has demonstrated, futile Protocols.

Serzh Sargsyan declared the Armenian-Turkish protocols null and void during a National Security Council session in the Presidential Palace on March 1 2018.

In 2008, at the initiative of the President of Armenia a new phase of normalization of the Armenian-Turkish relations began, which resulted in the Armenian and Turkish ministers of foreign affairs signing the “Protocol on the establishment of diplomatic relations between the Republic of Armenia and the Republic of Turkey” and “Protocol on development of relations between of the Republic of Armenia and the Republic of Turkey” on October 10, 2009 in Zurich.

However, after the signature, Turkey abruptly changed its position and rejected to implement the agreements on the normalization of the relations within a reasonable timeframe and without any preconditions, linking the ratification of the Protocols in the Grand National Assembly of Turkey to the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh issue.

English –translator/editor: Tigran Sirekanyan