President Erdoğan holds joint press conference with President Aliyev of Azerbaijan

 

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and President Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan held a joint press conference following their meeting.

Congratulating Azerbaijan on its victory in Nagorno-Karabakh, President Erdoğan said: “The outcome of the 44-day-long fight made us just as happy as our Azerbaijani brothers and sisters. I, personally, and my nation as a whole share this joy.”

Noting that he and his Azerbaijani counterpart discussed during their meeting why the Nagorno-Karabakh issue remained unresolved this long, President Erdoğan stated that the Minsk group failed for a long time to bring a solution to the issue and that a process ultimately started once Azerbaijan decided to take matters into its own hands. Further stressing that he cannot ignore Russian President Vladimir Putin’s contributions to the solution, President Erdoğan underlined that Mr. Putin’s positive stance helped the process follow a favorable trajectory.

“WE WANT TO TAKE THE STEPS OF PEACE”

Drawing attention to President Aliyev’s proposal to form a six-party platform for the establishment of regional peace, President Erdoğan said that Armenia can also join the platform alongside Russia, Turkey, Azerbaijan, Iran and Georgia. Should Yerevan fulfil its responsibilities related to such a platform, Turkey might also open its gates to Armenia, said the President, adding: “So long as these steps are taken, we don’t have any problems with opening our gates. That is so because we want to be the pigeons of peace. We want to take the steps of peace. We bear no grudges against the Armenian people. Our problem is with the Armenian administration. We have over 100 thousand Armenian citizens living in Turkey.”

Noting that Azerbaijan will launch an immense redevelopment and reconstruction scheme in the region now that a new picture has taken shape, President Erdoğan stated that works related to the infrastructure and suprastructure were also on the agenda during their meeting.

PRESIDENT ALIYEV OF AZERBAIJAN: “WE SHOULD FORM A NEW COOPERATION PLATFORM IN THE REGION”

President Aliyev, for his part, described the victory in Nagorno-Karabakh as a reflection of the Azerbaijan-Turkey unity, pointing out that the solidarity between Baku and Ankara is of importance not only for the two countries but also for the entire region.

President Aliyev said: “We are fully prepared for the new era following the historic victory. Today, we exchanged views on the new era with my precious brother and we saw that our views overlap. We should form a new cooperation platform in the region. This can be a multilateral platform and all the participants may benefit from it. There are already the traditional Turkey-Azerbaijan-Georgia cooperation, the Azerbaijan-Russia-Iran cooperation, and the Turkey-Russia-Iran cooperation. Combining all of these cooperation platforms, we can put forth a new platform. If the Armenian administration draws the right lessons from the war and looks to the future renouncing its baseless allegations, it can also have a place in this platform. We are open to cooperation. We should close this chapter. We should put an end to this animosity.”