BAKU. Dec 3 (Interfax) - Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has described military-technical cooperation as an important field in the strategic partnership between Russia and Azerbaijan despite Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan's appeal for countries in the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) not to sell weapons to Azerbaijan.
"I can only stress that military-technical cooperation is one of the spheres, one of the more important spheres in our strategic partnership with Azerbaijan," Lavrov said at a press conference on Tuesday after talks with Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov, commenting on Pashinyan's remarks that the CSTO countries should refuse to sell weapons to Azerbaijan in order to avert a possible escalation of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.
Russia and Azerbaijan have been developing cooperative ties "in an absolutely transparent fashion" and "in full compliance with the norms of international law, the norms of legislation in Azerbaijan and the Russian Federation, and taking full account of the balance which exists today and which is crucial to maintaining stability here," the Russian foreign minister said.
Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry spokesperson Leila Abdullayeva said earlier, commenting on Pashinyan's remarks, that "should such a need arise, Azerbaijan could buy new weapons from Russia" and "the settlement of the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh is in no way linked with the CSTO."