Armenian prime minister announces ‘painful’ truce with Azerbaijan in Nagorno-Karabakh, Putin pledges Russian peacekeepers

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan announced on Facebook late on November 9 that he has signed a truce with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to end armed hostilities in the contested Nagorno-Karabakh region. 

“Dear compatriots, sisters, and brothers. I have made a very difficult decision for myself and for all of us. I have signed a statement with the presidents of Russia and Azerbaijan to end the Karabakh War beginning at 1 a.m. The text is already published and the statement is incredibly painful for me and our people,” Pashinyan explained. The Armenian leader added that he considers the truce to be “neither victory nor defeat.” He says he agreed to end the war after a careful analysis of the military situation, calling it the “best solution available in the current situation.”

Armenian and Azerbaijani diplomats have agreed to several internationally brokered ceasefires in recent weeks, but the agreements have collapsed almost immediately.

Following Pashinyan’s announcement, several dozen men broke into the Armenian House of Government and vandalized the premises in protest against what critics say is Yerevan’s surrender to Baku. Local police officers did not intervene, according to the news agency Interfax.

Update: According to the text of the truce, Vladimir Putin agreed to deploy 1,960 Russian peacekeepers to the contested Karabakh region for a period of five years.