Special envoys from Turkey and Armenia met on the border of their countries. They continued discussions aimed at normalizing relations between the two arch-foes. Turkey and Armenia have no official relations, and their border has been closed since the 1990s.
In late 2021 they agreed to mend ties. Turkey closed its border with Armenia in 1993 to show solidarity with its close ally Azerbaijan in its conflict with Armenia over the Nagorno-Karabakh region. Turkey and Armenia also have a long and bitter relationship over the deaths of some 1.5 million Armenians, which began in 1915 when Turkey was still the Ottoman Caliphate.
In 2020, Turkey strongly backed Azerbaijan in its six-week conflict with Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh, which ended with a Russian-brokered peace deal that left Azerbaijan in control of most of the region. Azerbaijan used Turkish military equipment, including combat drones, in the conflict.
Turkey and Armenia also have a long and bitter relationship over the deaths of some 1.5 million Armenians in massacres, deportations and forced marches that began in 1915. Historians widely view the events as genocide. Turkey fiercely rejects that label. It acknowledges that many people died during the period but insists the death toll is exaggerated and that the deaths were the result of civil unrest.
Turkish television HaberTurk broadcast Tuesday the two envoys shaking hands at the border, before visiting the Turkish and Armenian sides of the frontier. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan held their first face-to-face meeting in 2022, on the sidelines of a European Political Community meeting in Prague. Last year,
Pashinyan visited Ankara to attend Erdogan's inauguration after winning the election. It was the second attempt at reconciliation between Ankara and Yerevan. Turkey and Armenia reached a deal in 2009 to establish official relations and open their borders. But the agreement was never ratified.
The border gate was briefly opened in 2023 to allow aid in, after a devastating earthquake struck southern Turkey and northern Syria. (ps/you)
