I am pleased to welcome my colleague - the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Belarus Sergei Martynov who is in Yerevan on an official visit.

I was in Minsk on an official visit last year and with a return visit today Sergei Martynov is here.

During our talks we spoke about the full range of our bilateral relations, as well as we touched upon a number of regional and international issues.

Regarding the bilateral relations, we mentioned with satisfaction that our relations are dynamically developing and the Ministries of Foreign Affairs of the two countries hold regular consultations. Over the past three years we held three consultations between our ministries, and there are two new consultations on the agenda.

We are fully cooperating in the frames of the international organizations, like the UN, the OSCE, the CIS and of course the CSTO, as well as in other formats.

The inter-parliamentary relations are dynamically developing and the interregional cooperation and decentralized interaction are taking concrete forms. Many Armenian regions (marzes), such as Syunik, Shirak, Tavush, Ararat and Kotayk cooperate with their counterparts from Belarus, and there are agreements on cooperation between many cities of those regions. These are not just reciprocal visits, but also concrete projects and ideas of cooperation which are implemented between them annually.

Today we had a thorough talk both on our economic and trade relations, and we discussed the ways and steps needed to be undertaken for giving an impetus to the those relations.

We have quite a solid legal framework, and there are over 70 agreements. We permanently update and complement that framework with new agreements.

During the meeting I informed my colleague about the ongoing process of the negotiations on the Nagonro-Karabakh issue.

During that short period we touched upon many issues, but the talks will still be continued today and tomorrow, during the reciprocal official visits.

I am pleased once again to welcome Sergei Martynov, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Belarus in Yerevan.