Armenia, Azerbaijan exchange prisoners at border

Azerbaijan and Armenia have traded prisoners-of-war at their border in a step towards normalising their relations after Azerbaijan achieved a decisive breakthrough in their decades-old conflict.

"Azerbaijan freed 32 Armenian military, Armenia freed two Azerbaijani military," Azerbaijan's state commission for prisoners of war said in a statement on Wednesday.

Russia's TASS news agency reported earlier on Wednesday that Armenia and Azerbaijan were also discussing the withdrawal of troops from their shared border, though it said no decision had yet been taken.

"Thirty-one personnel from Armenia's armed forces captured in 2020-2023 and one serviceman captured in Karabakh in September have crossed the Azerbaijani-Armenian border and are on Armenian territory," Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan wrote on his Facebook account.

Announcing the planned prisoner exchange last week, the two sides said they "reconfirm their intention to normalise relations and to reach a peace treaty on the basis of respect for the principles of sovereignty and territorial integrity".

'Historical chance'

In the joint statement, Baku and Yerevan pledged to seize "a historical chance to achieve a long-awaited peace in the region".

The agreement was welcomed by the EU, the US, as well as regional powers Türkiye and Russia, which have tried for decades to persuade the two countries to sign a peace treaty to settle outstanding issues including the demarcation of their borders.

Karabakh, internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan, broke from Baku's control in the early 1990s after a war. Azerbaijan recaptured swathes of land in and around it in a 2020 war.

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Source: TRT