Azerbaijan has extended an official invitation to Armenia to attend the COP29 global climate summit, set to take place in Baku this November.
Hikmet Hajiyev, a senior aide to Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, announced over the weekend that the invitation had been sent to the Armenian Foreign Ministry, describing it as a gesture of Azerbaijan’s goodwill.
As of Tuesday evening, the Armenian Foreign Ministry had not confirmed whether Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan would accept the invitation.
Andranik Kocharyan, a senior pro-government lawmaker in Armenia, stated that acceptance of the invitation depends on Azerbaijan demonstrating a commitment to peace with Armenia. However, Kocharyan did not specify whether this would require Azerbaijan to drop its preconditions for an Armenian-Azerbaijani peace treaty or release the remaining Armenian prisoners, including eight former leaders of Nagorno-Karabakh. He noted that their continued captivity is an “obstacle to achieving peace.”
Armenia had previously dropped its objections to Azerbaijan hosting the United Nations summit last December as part of a deal that led to the release of 32 Armenian soldiers and civilians held by Azerbaijan.
In May, another aide to Aliyev suggested that the two South Caucasus nations could sign the peace treaty during the global forum. However, Aliyev has repeatedly made this conditional on Armenia amending its constitution, which he claims contains territorial claims to Azerbaijan. Additionally, Aliyev has demanded that Yerevan ensure the safe return of ethnic Azerbaijanis who fled Soviet Armenia in the late 1980s.
Armenian opposition leaders argue that Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has already made significant concessions to Azerbaijan and Turkey to retain power. They have strongly criticized his earlier decision to cede several border areas to Azerbaijan without securing any territorial concessions in return.
Pashinyan has defended the land transfer as necessary to prevent Azerbaijani aggression against Armenia. However, his critics contend that this policy of appeasement could have the opposite effect. On June 19, the Armenian Foreign Ministry claimed that Azerbaijan might be planning to launch a “new aggression” against Armenia after hosting COP29.
