YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 12, ARMENPRESS. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan says he attaches great importance to the necessity of involving a representative of the people of Artsakh in the NK conflict settlement negotiations. The Armenian PM also reiterated his readiness to be fully involved in the negotiations process.

The PM was speaking at the parliament session today in response to a question from Republican faction MP Tajat Vardapetyan.

Vardapetyan mentioned that Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has commented on Pashinyan’s statement on making Artsakh a negotiations party, and said that the responsibility of obstructing the talks in this case falls on Armenia.

“Certainly, I have numerously expressed readiness to be fully involved in the negotiations process. I have said that I consider myself to be authorized to negotiate on behalf of Armenia, because I am the Prime Minister of Armenia, but I am not authorized to negotiate on behalf of Artsakh. The people of Artsakh do not participate in the government formation in Armenia, since they have their own government, president, which is capable of negotiating on behalf of Artsakh,” Pashinyan said.

“We very clearly put a simple question – are we negotiating simply for negotiations, or to solve the issue? If we are negotiating to solve the issue, how do we imagine the solution of the issue without the  party of the conflict? If we are negotiating for negotiations, we are ready for this format also. However, as long as the necessity of involvement of a representative of the people of Artsakh hasn’t been recorded, it means that we haven’t gotten close to the settlement of the issue at all,” he said.

According to the PM, the belligerent atmosphere which is established as result of the destructive actions of the Azerbaijani leadership is obstructing the negotiations process the most. “I reaffirm my readiness to be fully involved in the negotiations process. There is no single case when it was proposed to negotiate and Armenia has refused,” he said.

Edited and translated by Stepan Kocharyan