Alexander Pracht
Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan has addressed hostile rhetoric from Azerbaijani officials, including President Ilham Aliyev, saying unfriendly statements undermine peacebuilding efforts.
“Every once in a while we hear rhetoric, sometimes coming from [Azerbaijani] officials, that does not contribute to peace, to put it mildly. There is no denying that. Peacebuilding, even in situations other than ours, requires constant caution,” Mirzoyan said today while speaking before the parliamentary commission on foreign affairs.
Mirzoyan acknowledged that the situation is not entirely positive and acknowledged that problems remain in normalization with Azerbaijan. He followed up with a rhetorical question: should Armenia continue working toward normalizing relations under these conditions or abandon the progress already made?
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There have been no hostilities between Yerevan and Baku, including shooting incidents along the border, since August 2025, when the two countries signed a U.S.-mediated declaration on peace at a White House summit. However, a comprehensive peace treaty remains unsigned, with Azerbaijan demanding that Armenia amend its constitution to rule out any territorial claims to Karabakh.
Since the summit, both Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Aliyev have described the current state of relations as de facto peace, although Aliyev has continued to use markedly different rhetoric in speeches aimed at domestic and international audiences. The latest example came earlier this month, when Aliyev addressed a convention of his New Azerbaijan Party.
“There is no place for emotions in politics. If we had given in to emotions, today, most likely, the third Victory Arch would have been standing in the center of Yerevan,” Aliyev said. He was referring to two triumphal arches erected after the 2020 Karabakh war, one in Baku and another in Stepanakert, the capital of Karabakh.
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