Azerbaijan-Armenia: U.S. 'Pleased' As Foreign Ministers Met To Kick Off Fresh Talks In Arlington

Washington D.C./28.06.23/Turan:   The United States said on Tuesday it was "pleased" and "honored" to host Azerbaijani and Armenian Foreign Ministers to facilitate negotiations, as they met outside Washington to begin another round of closed-door talks, TURAN's Washington correspondent reports.
This is the second time in less than two month that Jeyhun Bayramov and Ararat Mirzoyan have gotten together at the State Department's newly renovated George Schultz National Foreign Affairs Training Center.

Secretary Antony Blinken met both individually with each minister Tuesday morning, and then held a meeting with the two of them together, "Dialogue is key to lasting peace." Blinken later tweeted.

State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller, in his turn, told a daily press briefing that the United States was "encouraged" by recent efforts of Armenia and Azerbaijan to engage productively on the peace process. "We will continue to assist them any way that we can to build on that momentum."

In the meantime, Miller, when pressed by TURAN's correspondent, refrained from offering any insight into confidential talks, and/or engaging in expectation setting. "I probably wouldn’t be successful even if I did," he said. "I don’t think we want to talk about talks one-third of the way through," he went on to explain.

Miller concluded: "I’m going to wait to pass judgement on what happens until these three days of meetings conclude, but we do think that peace is within reach if the two parties will put aside their differences."

Blinken is expected to join the ministers at the closing ceremony of the meeting tomorrow.

Alex Raufoglu