From April 1, border guards instead of the Armed Forces will guard the road connecting the Lachin corridor to Armenia, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said today at a session of the RA government, referring to the latest developments related to the change of the Lachin corridor route.
According to him, the next development regarding the Lachin corridor is connected to the change of the route.
“As you are aware, as a result of the agreement reached in August 2022 between the authorities of Azerbaijan and Nagorno-Karabakh, the route of the Lachin corridor was changed with the commissioning of a new road. But since the road connecting the Lachin corridor to the Republic of Armenia was not fully ready, a temporary route was put into operation, which entered the territory of the Republic of Armenia via the Kornidzor bridge, then again into the territory of Azerbaijan, then again into the territory of the Republic of Armenia. According to the reached understanding, that route was to operate until April 1, 2023,” said Pashinyan.
He stated that the day before, Armenia had informed the Azerbaijani side that, in accordance with the understanding, after the Kornidzor bridge the road would continue only through the territory of Armenia, and that the border guard troops of the Republic of Armenia would assume the protection of the state border of the Republic of Armenia in that section.
“I must emphasize that the border guard troops will be deployed on the state border of the Republic of Armenia, in the same positions where units of the Ministry of Defense were deployed until now. I must note that a short while ago information appeared in the Azerbaijani news flow that attempts to present what happened as another blockbuster, forgive me for this word.
This approach is at least not constructive. I repeat that no change in the Armenian positions has taken place as a result of all this, with the difference that we intend to carry out the protection of the section in question, unlike before, through the Border Guard Troops.
That is, the change that is taking place is the following: from the same positions, along the state border of the Republic of Armenia, units of the Ministry of Defense will leave, according to plan, and in their place units of the Border Guard Troops will be deployed. We have also made the same proposal to Azerbaijan, so that the same happens on the Azerbaijani side. I hope that this process will take place without provocations,” said Pashinyan.
The Prime Minister noted that despite all difficulties, the government of the Republic of Armenia “tirelessly reaffirms its commitment to the peace agenda.”
“We hope that in the near future there will be concrete movements, both in the Stepanakert-Baku and Armenia-Azerbaijan negotiation formats. The Republic of Armenia is ready for such work, and we hope that in the Stepanakert-Baku format there will be such readiness on the part of both Baku and Stepanakert. It is clear, of course, that in this context the operation of proper international mechanisms and guarantees is extremely important,” said Pashinyan.
