- FROM AFP NEWS
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan on Tuesday accused Azerbaijan of "ethnic cleansing" in Nagorno-Karabakh but said he stood ready to normalise relations with Baku by the end of the year.
The broadside came ahead of planned EU-mediated talks in Brussels later this month between Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev.
"We, the international community, have been unable to prevent the ethnic cleansing of Armenians from Nagorno-Karabakh," Pashinyan told a plenary session of the European Parliament in Strasbourg, France.
"Nagorno-Karabakh has been cleansed of Armenians… in a matter of one week," he went on.
"Azerbaijan has clearly and unequivocally demonstrated its decision to render life for Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh impossible."
Tensions remain high between the two Caucasian neighbours.
In September Aliyev's troops recaptured Nagorno-Karabakh, a breakaway enclave in Azerbaijan. Most of the 120,000 ethnic Armenians who had been living there fled to Armenia.
Pashinyan nonetheless said the outline of a deal drawn up over this year, including at a European summit held in Spain two weeks ago, laid the groundwork for an accord between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
"We have agreed that we will have a meeting in Brussels during this month.
"And if the aforementioned principles are officially reconfirmed, then the signing of a peace and normalisation agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan will become highly realistic by the end of this year," he said.
The outline deal calls for Azerbaijan and Armenia to recognise each other's borders as established at the collapse of the Soviet Union, to which they had both belonged.
It also includes the exchange of prisoners and a guarantee that routes in the region are opened.
Azerbaijan says it is not seeking to rid Nagorno-Karabakh of ethnic Armenians and has invited them to return to their homes in the enclave and "reintegrate" into Azerbaijan.
No date has yet been publicly fixed for the EU-mediated talks between both sides.
European Council President Charles Michel told AFP at the Spain summit on October 5 the negotiations would happen "by the end of October".
The precise timing would be worked out in consultation with Pashinyan and Aliyev.
Michel's spokeswoman did not immediately respond on Tuesday when asked by AFP if any date had been agreed.
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https://www.barrons.com/news/pashinyan-accuses-azerbaijan-of-driving-armenians-from-karabakh-4363dc34