Protesters have staged a rally in northern Armenia against government plans to cede villages to Azerbaijan as part of efforts to reach a peace deal, local media reported. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said his country would return four abandoned villages that it had seized in the 1990s.

Kirants

In northern Armenia, protesters have taken to the streets in opposition to the government's plans to cede villages to Azerbaijan. This protest movement is a direct response to an announcement by the Armenian Prime Minister, Nikol Pashinyan, indicating that Armenia would return four abandoned villages it seized in the 1990s as part of efforts to reach a peace agreement with Azerbaijan.

The contentious territorial concessions are part of a broader peace negotiation process following decades of conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan, including wars fought in the 1990s and as recently as 2020. Protesters have blocked roads with benches and cars, expressing their dissatisfaction with the loss of what they consider strategic lands vital to the nation. The demonstrators argue that such deals compromise their livelihoods and the sovereign integrity of Armenia.

In a recent development, Armenia and Azerbaijan have made progress on delineating their shared border, using pre-Soviet Union maps as a guide. This comes after last September's military advancements by Azerbaijan in the Nagorno-Karabakh region, which led to the displacement of approximately 100,000 ethnic Armenians. The Azerbaijani President has highlighted the shift towards a peace agreement, underscoring a newfound mutual understanding on the structure of such an agreement, albeit details are yet to be finalized.

Among Azerbaijani's demands is the establishment of a land corridor through Armenia to connect Azerbaijan with its Nakhchivan territory, thereby enhancing the connection with its ally Turkey. This development occurs amidst a backdrop of changing military presences in the region, with some 2,000 Russian soldiers withdrawing and being replaced by Azerbaijani and Armenian forces stationed on their respective sides of the contested border.



Armenia villagers protest territorial concessions to Azerbaijan

blocking roads with benches and cars to contest a new border. These Armenians are protesting against their government for agreeing last month to return four of Armenia's frontier villages to neighbouring Azerbaijan. They'd been taken over by Armenian forces in the 1990s and they held a strategic importance for the landlocked nation. Today for many Armenians such a deal is unacceptable. They've moved the border into the village. A peasant can't live there. It's impossible. We're fighting for our lands, for our own lands. On Tuesday Armenia and Azerbaijan announced that they'd laid a first border marker and had made progress on defining areas of their shared border. As a guide Baku and Yerevan are using maps from before the fall of the Soviet Union. This comes after decades of territorial disputes and wars between the nations in the 1990s and in 2020. And it's on the heels of last September's military offensive when Azerbaijan in lightning speed took over the Nagorno-Karabakh region. Some 100,000 ethnic Armenians fled. For the Azerbaijani president whose military largely outweighs Armenia's a peace deal which wasn't even on the table in 2020 could soon become a reality. We did not even have a draft of peace agreement at that time but now we have it. Now we have common understanding how the peace agreement should look like. We only need to address the details. Among the Azerbaijani demands Baku wants a land corridor seen here in red. It would go through Armenia to connect Azerbaijan to the Nakhchivan area which would bring it closer to its ally Turkey. The ongoing negotiations come as some 2,000 Russian soldiers pulled out of the region with Azerbaijani and Armenian ones taking their place each on their side of the contested border.

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