United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke on Sunday with Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliyev to underscore the importance of Azerbaijan-Armenia negotiations about the situation in Karabakh and pledged continued support from Washington regarding reaching a peaceful solution to the crisis, Ednews informs via Teletrader.
Blinken "expressed the United States' deep concern that Azerbaijan's establishment of a checkpoint on the Lachin corridor undermines efforts to establish confidence in the peace process, and emphasized the importance of reopening the Lachin corridor to commercial and private vehicles as soon as possible," according to a statement issued by the department's spokesperson Matthew Miller.
Blinken separately spoke with Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan the day before, shortly after a senior Armenian official confirmed negotiations will start soon.