October 19, 2020
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo during a press briefing on Oct. 14
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is scheduled to meet with the foreign ministers of Armenia and Azerbaijan, Zohrab Mnatsakanyan and Jeyhun Bayramov in Washington on Friday, POLITICO reported on Monday, adding that “the visits also offer the Trump administration a chance to showcase an attempt at global leadership just days before President Donald Trump faces reelection.”
According to U.S. government documents seen by POLITICO, Bayramov will meet first with Pompeo on Friday morning., with Mnatsakanyan scheduled for a meeting “shortly afterward.”
Ideally, he said, the two countries can resume meaningful negotiations soon. Armenia’s ambassador in Washington, Armenia’s Ambassador to the U.S. Varuzhan Nersesyan, praised Pompeo for calling out Turkey over its support for Azerbaijan during the conflict, telling POLITICO that ideally Armenia and Azerbaijan can resume “meaningful negotiations.”
“We see no alternative to the peaceful resolution of this conflict based on mutual compromises,” Nersesyan told POLITICO.
“We want a substantive conversation,” Azerbaijan’s Ambassador to the U.S. Elin Suleymonov told POLITICO. He also did not rule out the possibility of “an encounter” between Mnatsakanyan and Bayramov while they are in Washington.
Trump on Sunday visited Newport Beach where hundreds of Armenian-American called on the administration for decisive action on Artsakh. At a rally in Carson City, Nevada later in the day, Trump acknowledged what he called Armenian “supporters,” saying “we’re working on something great,” presumably referring to the Karabakh war.
