Jeyhun Bayramov: Russia wanted to send peacekeepers to region as early as October 10, 2020

During the Second Karabakh War, the Moscow meeting stood out for its high level of tension, Azerbaijan"s Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov said in an interview with İTV.

According to Report, the minister recalled that on October 8, 2020, the Russian side persistently proposed holding negotiations with Armenia:

"An agreement to hold the meeting was reached on October 9. When the negotiations began, an interesting point was that Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov presented a document to both sides. It consisted of only a few clauses. It proposed that on the night of October 10, all hostilities should cease, Russian peacekeepers and the Azerbaijani army be deployed on the eastern side of the contact line, and Russian peacekeepers and the Armenian army on the western side."

According to Bayramov, the document did not include the liberation of territories or any other key issues:

"This meant a complete freezing of the situation, after which nothing else could happen. Based on our position, we stated that we were ready to negotiate with Armenia, but it must specify when it would withdraw its troops from the occupied territories. The Armenian side also opposed the document."

The minister reminded that the negotiations lasted several hours, but the positions of the parties remained unchanged. At one point, Lavrov made a maneuver, saying that a conversation between the leaders had taken place the day before, and although he was aware of it, in his observation, the sides" positions still differed:

"In response, we asked for a break to discuss the issue within our delegation. We were offered a room, but we decided to go to our embassy, while the Armenian delegation stayed at the negotiation venue. At the embassy, we maintained communication through certain channels, received instructions from Mr. President, and prepared our next steps. When we returned to the talks, Lavrov would leave the room whenever he received calls from Russian President Vladimir Putin and Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu. We made it clear that we would not back down from our position."

Bayramov noted that for the Armenian side, it was extremely important to reach a result that very day.

"We said we could continue the negotiations the next day. While we were there, news came that Hadrut had been liberated from occupation. We were informed of this development. About 15 minutes later, we noticed panic among the members of the Armenian delegation - it was a remarkable moment. We told them that Hadrut had been liberated, because when the Armenian side had previously proposed the 5+2 format (the release of five out of seven occupied districts, excluding Kalbajar and Lachin), we stated that this option was no longer relevant, since Jabrayil and Hadrut had already been liberated," the minister emphasized.