President Donald Trump will host a signing ceremony on the White Home on Aug. 8 for a peace settlement between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
In a Fact Social publish on Aug. 7, Trump wrote that he’d be internet hosting the President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev and the Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan for a “Historic Peace Summit” on the White Home on Friday.
“These two Nations have been at War for many years, resulting in the deaths of thousands of people. Many Leaders have tried to end the War, with no success, until now,” Trump mentioned, including that his administration has been “engaged with both sides for quite some time.”
Trump can even signal bilateral agreements with Armenia and Azerbaijan “to pursue Economic opportunities together, so we can fully unlock the potential of the South Caucasus Region.”
The 2 nations have engaged in cross-border conflicts for the reason that late Eighties. On the time, the Azerbaijani area of Nagorno-Karabakh, which had a largely ethnic-Armenian inhabitants, broke away from Azerbaijan with Armenia’s assist.
Since successful independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, Armenia and Azerbaijan have fought two wars, with Azerbaijan reclaiming massive parts of territory in 2020. In 2023, its forces captured the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh area.
A peace settlement between the 2 nations might remodel the South Caucasus, an energy-producing area that neighbors Europe, Turkey, Iran, and Russia. The South Caucasus is intersected by fuel and oil pipelines however beset by longstanding ethnic conflicts and closed borders.
“I am very proud of these courageous Leaders for doing the right thing for the Great People of Armenia and Azerbaijan,” Trump mentioned on Fact Social. “It will be a Historic Day for Armenia, Azerbaijan, the United States, and THE WORLD.”
In March, Trump’s particular envoy Steve Witkoff visited the Armenian-Azerbaijan area to work in direction of negotiating a peace settlement between the 2 neighbors.
The announcement of Friday’s peace signing ceremony follows Trump’s current diplomatic efforts that culminated in peace speak breakthroughs between India and Pakistan, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Cambodia and Thailand.
Nevertheless, a extremely anticipated cease-fire between Moscow and Kyiv to finish a greater than three-year-long conflict that started with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 has been extra elusive.
Final week, Trump urged Russian President Vladimir Putin to finish his conflict in Ukraine inside “10 or 12 days from today” or face new financial sanctions and punitive measures.
The Kremlin mentioned on Thursday that it will meet with the U.S. president “in the coming days.”
Ryan Morgan, Victoria Friedman, Chris Summers, and Reuters contributed to this report.
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