Armenian president hopes for improvement of relations with Turkey with Erdogan's election president
YEREVAN. Aug 13 (Interfax) - Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan has congratulated Recep Tayyip Erdogan on being elected president of Turkey and wished him good health and the Turkish people wellbeing and progress, the Armenian presidential press service told Interfax.
"Having taken the office of Turkish president, you definitely have the opportunity to apply your efforts in implementing bilateral agreements that we have reached without preconditions," Sargsyan said in an address to Erdogan.
Armenia and Turkey have no diplomatic relations, and the border between the two countries has been closed at Ankara's initiative since 1993 because of lack of progress in settling the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh.
The Armenian and Turkish foreign ministers signed a protocol on establishing diplomatic relations and a protocol on developing bilateral relations in Zurich in October 2009, which the two parliaments have not ratified. The Armenian president signed a decree on suspending the ratification of the Armenian-Turkish protocols in April 2010.
Armenia objected to tying the normalization of its relations with Turkey to the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh problem.
Sargsyan said in January 2013 that Turkey and Azerbaijan would not force Armenia to make unilateral concessions on Nagorno-Karabakh "despite the continuing blockade of Armenia."
