Forecast: In St. Petersburg Aliyev will again try to remove introduction of investigative mechanisms in conflict zone from agenda of negotiations

 In St.Petersburg, Ilham Aliyev will again try to remove the introduction of investigative mechanisms in the conflict zone from the agenda of negotiations, Manvel Sargsyan, Director of the Armenian Center for National and International Studies, has told ArmInfo.      

"I think there is nothing unexpected in the current military exercises in Azerbaijan, because Baku's attempt to demonstrate its forces fits into the regional geopolitical trends. In particular, Azerbaijan has initiated large-scale exercises on the border with Artsakh after Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoygu's statement about continuation and expansion of military and technical cooperation with Azerbaijan," he says.   

The Armenian, Russian and Azerbaijani Presidents' talks scheduled for June 20 in St.Petersburg are the continuation of the Armenian and Azerbaijani Presidents' meeting on May 16 in Vienna, where Sargsyan and Aliyev pointed out the need to resolve the Karabakh conflict peacefully. To note, on June 19-24, Azerbaijan is holding military exercises on the territories adjacent to Artsakh. As many as 25,000 servicemen are participating in the exercises.    

Sargsyan thinks that Aliyev sought to change the format of the meeting in St.Petersburg. He hoped to get German Chancellor Angela Merkel's support during his visit to Germany on June 7. Merkel recalled the "key role of Russia in the conflict settlement". At the same time, US Co-Chair of the OSCE Minsk Group James Warlick announced his intention to take part in the Presidents' meeting in St. Petersburg. 

Sargsyan thinks that Moscow and Baku might have agreed to change the agenda of negotiations. However, such an agreement might have been disrupted by a statement of the OSCE, which absolved itself of the responsibility for the outcome of such negotiations, Sargsyan says. The analyst thinks that the Russian Foreign Ministry's hasty statement about the lack of a "Lavrov plan" on the Karabakh conflict settlement vividly demonstrates the disruption of the plan to change the negotiation agenda.