A Coordinating Meeting of the Asian Parliamentary Assembly (APA) was held on the sidelines of the 149th Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) Assembly in Geneva, Switzerland.

The APA Coordinating meeting was chaired by Rizvan Nabiyev, head of Azerbaijani parliamentary delegation and representative of the chairman of the organization, which is currently chaired by Azerbaijan.

Addressing the event, Nabiyev provided insights into the political realities emerged in the South Caucasus following the end of the armed conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan, as well as the developments taking pace in the post-conflict period. Rizvan Nabiyev noted that it was Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, who put forward an initiative to sign a peace treaty with Armenia. “Armenia’s making amendments to its constitution and abandoning territorial claims against Azerbaijan are prerequisite to signing a peace treaty and ensuring the full normalization of relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan,” he said.

The head of the delegation also pointed out that despite the appeals of the Western Azerbaijan Community representing 300,000 Azerbaijani refugees, the Armenian government avoids dialogue and ensuring the right of return as enshrined in various international human rights documents.

Rizvan Nabiyev also recalled the 29th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP29) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, which will be the first hosted in the South Caucasus and the wider region. He also underlined that Azerbaijan had elaborated an ambitious Action Agenda comprising 14 initiatives on a range of issues such as peace, finance, human capital, to mention just a few.