During the September 12 National Assembly session, Deputy Speaker Hakob Arshakyan addressed opposition criticism of the Washington document, stressing that it is entirely based on reciprocity.
“There is no clause that is not grounded in reciprocity. All provisions apply equally to both Armenia and Azerbaijan, and this is fixed in a separate article of the document,” Arshakyan said, 1lurer.am reports.
Responding to opposition claims that Armenia’s independence itself is an obstacle for Turkey and thus justifies closed borders and hostility, Arshakyan challenged that reasoning:
“Why is it so? Have you ever answered that question? Why should any state consider Armenia an insurmountable obstacle to its interests? Does this stem from our interests, or from those of another country? Answer that question, because we already know the answer. That is why our path is the path of peace.”
On August 8 at the White House, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, U.S. President Donald Trump, and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev signed a joint declaration following their trilateral meeting.
At the same time, Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan and Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov, in the presence of the three leaders, preliminarily signed the “Agreement on Peace and the Establishment of Interstate Relations between the Republic of Armenia and the Republic of Azerbaijan.”
