Dear colleague,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

It is my pleasure to be back to Helsinki upon the invitation of my colleague, Minister Timo Soini. It is a good opportunity to discuss the ways of the further strengthening of our relations, and exchange views on important regional and international issues.

We had a fruitful meeting, whereby we agreed to intensify high-level visits, activate political consultations between the two Foreign Ministries, enhance interaction within the international organisations, encourage our parliamentarians to boost their contacts and cooperation within parliamentary assemblies, expand the legal framework of our bilateral relations.

During the negotiations we touched upon the deepening of economic cooperation, enhancement of cultural exchanges.

We have exchanged views on the elaboration of a new legal basis of Armenia-EU relations. I emphasized once again that Armenia is interested in further strengthening mutually beneficial partnership with the EU.

Ladies and gentlemen,

Naturally, much of our today's discussions was focused on situation created as a result of Azerbaijan’s large-scale military offensive against Nagorno-Karabakh and on the ways to address its consequences.

I informed my colleague that, despite the numerous appeals of the three Co-Chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group and the international community to fully respect the trilateral ceasefire agreements of 1994 and 1995, Azerbaijan has continued their violations, concentrating heavy weaponry and military forces along the entire Line of Contact with Nagorno-Karabakh, further increasing its warmongering and launching a provocative propaganda campaign on international arena trying to accuse the Armenian side in exactly what it is itself doing, thus preparing ground for new military attacks which can have far-reaching consequences for the whole region.

We are sharing the view with the international community that there is no alternative to the exclusively peaceful negotiated settlement of this issue.

To restore the negotiation environment immense efforts will be needed. First of all it is imperative to implement the proposal of the three Co-Chair countries, supported by the international community to create a mechanism of investigation of the ceasefire regime violations, and to secure and guarantee the unconditional implementation of ceasefire agreements of 1994 and 1995. All those proposals are fully supported by Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

With Minister Soini we have discussed also number of international and regional topics, including situation in the Middle East, migration crisis, fight against terrorism, etc.

I have taken this opportunity to extend an invitation to Minister Soini to visit Armenia.

Once again I would like to thank you, dear colleague, dear friend for your invitation, and the warm hospitality.

Thank you.