“Turkey will always support Baku’s equitable position in settlement of the Armenian-Azerbaijani Nagorno-Karabakh conflict,” the Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said in Nakhchivan on 4 June after negotiations with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev.

The Turkish Prime Minister is paying a 1-day official visit to the Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic of Azerbaijan (NAR). In the first half of the day, Erdogan held twosome negotiations with Azerbaijani President. Moreover, Aliyev and Erdogan headed the negotiations between two countries’ governmental delegations at the NAR Supreme Assembly (Parliament).

At the briefing after negotiations, President Aliyev thanked Turkey for its permanent support to Azerbaijan in the peace negotiations with Armenia.

The conflict between the two countries of the South Caucasus began in 1988 due to Armenian territorial claims against Azerbaijan. Since 1992, Armenian Armed Forces have occupied 20% of Azerbaijan including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and its seven surrounding districts. In 1994, Azerbaijan and Armenia signed a ceasefire agreement at which time the active hostilities ended. The Co-Chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group ( Russia, France, and the US) are currently holding peaceful negotiations.