Alen Simonyan says Armenia ready to return enclaves to Azerbaijan in exchange of Artsvashen 

Armenia is ready to return the enclaves that existed during the Soviet era to Azerbaijan, receiving in exchange the village of Artsvashen, which was also located within the enclave, Speaker of the Armenian Parliament Alen Simonyan said today.

“I am sure that we will find a solution to this issue. I cannot say anything specifically now, but if there are legal grounds, we are ready to return their enclaves to them, and they will return our Artsvashen,” Simonyan told reporters.

He added that the territory of Artsvashen is larger than “those two or three enclaves that Azerbaijan can talk about.”

According to Simonyan, it is currently difficult to find documents that indicate the demarcation lines of the enclaves. He added that another option is also possible, providing for the preservation of enclaves for the countries on whose territory they are located.

Previously, the Armenian authorities recognized that with the proposed border delimitation with Azerbaijan, it may be necessary to take into account the existence of specific territorial entities, such as the Armenian enclave of Artsvashen on the territory of former Soviet Azerbaijan and seven enclaves of the former Azerbaijan SSR on the territory of former Soviet Armenia.

As a result of the interethnic confrontation in the early 1990s, these enclaves were actually absorbed by the parties to the conflict, and their population was replaced by settlers.

The Armenian opposition considers the transfer of enclaves to Baku unacceptable, since through one of the former Azerbaijani enclaves—the village of Tigranashen in the Ararat region—there is a road connecting Armenia with Iran, and through the former enclaves in the Tavush region, there is a highway leading to the Georgian border.