Russia’s Lavrov to discuss Karabakh tensions with Azerbaijan – RIA

(Reuters) – Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov will visit Baku this week to discuss tensions between Azerbaijan and Armenia over the enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh, Russia’s RIA news agency said on Wednesday.

The dispute over Nagorno-Karabakh, a mountainous territory inside Azerbaijan controlled since the 1990s by ethnic Armenians supported by Yerevan, flared in 2020 into a six-week war in which Azeri troops regained swathes of territory.

Although Russia brokered a ceasefire and both nations agreed to work on a peace plan, the two periodically accuse each other of firing shells across the border, RIA noted.

Lavrov will be in Baku on Thursday and Friday to meet President Ilham Aliyev and Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov.

“The meetings will be devoted, according to the Russian foreign ministry, to the implementation of the 2020 trilateral agreements between Russia, Armenia and Azerbaijan on

cessation of hostilities,” RIA said.

Delegations from Armenia and Azerbaijan met on their international border on May 24 in a choreographed step towards ending the 30-year dispute.

The peace plan has sparked sometimes violent protests in Armenia fueled by opposition claims that Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan was making too many concessions.

(Reporting by David Ljunggren; Editing by Sandra Maler)