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international

Interview with H. e. Deputy Foreign Minister of Armenia

Vahan Kostanyan

The Human Rights 75 High-Level Event I read that there are quite a few interesting
in Geneva at the end of last year drew an things going on right now in the conflict
impressive gathering dignitary, and one of between Armenia and Azerbaijan. Could you
them travelling all the way to Geneva for it tell us a little bit more about it?
was the young and dynamic Deputy Foreign Well, at the same time, they’re both going
Minister of Armenia. At the age of 30, he has on and not going on. We just had a good
already acquired substantial international humanitarian step forward, which looks
experience. Let us briefly mention: he started promising. As a sign of goodwill, the Armenian
his career as Assistant to the Deputy of the side released two Azerbaijani soldiers detained
National Assembly of Armenia, from where in Armenia, and the Azerbaijani side released
he became the head of the First Deputy Prime 32 of our detainees. Unfortunately, there are
Minister’s Office of Armenia. devoted to his job, still 23 remaining in custody in Azerbaijan.
he represents the new faces of the Armenian
political class and diplomatic service. We had We believe that it was a good confidence-
a chance to meet him in Geneva. building measure between the two sides that
can help the negotiation process in general.
Mr Deputy Foreign Minister, could you tell us It also should be highlighted that, while
a little bit about yourself and your work? confidence-building measures can help, they
I’ve been in this in this post since January cannot replace real negotiations. There were
2023. I’m in charge of neighbouring countries a couple of attempts to reconvene the two
and the Middle East. This involves the sides for negotiations, both on the leaders’
normalization processes with both Azerbaijan level and on the ministerial level. There were
and Türkiye. efforts by the European Union as well as the

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