An agreement on the stage-by-stage settlement of the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict was reached in St. Petersburg, Novruz Mammadov, deputy head of Azerbaijani presidential administration, chief of the administration's foreign relations department, said in an interview with local TV channels June 22.

St. Petersburg hosted a summit of Azerbaijani, Russian and Armenian presidents, Ilham Aliyev, Vladimir Putin and Serzh Sargsyan with participation of the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs June 20.

“During that meeting, the priority was given to the stage-by-stage settlement of the conflict. That’s to say, from now on, it is necessary to act step by step in the settlement process: first, the liberation of Azerbaijan’s five districts, then two more districts and determining the corridor and afterwards, determining the status of Nagorno-Karabakh,” said the top official.

“The parties in principle, reached agreements in this regard,” added Mammadov.

“Such an agreement has been reached for the present,” said the top official.

Mammadov didn’t rule out that as before, Armenia can take provocative steps and refuse from fulfilling its promise.

The top official said that given a very high level of relations between Azerbaijan and Russia, their strategic partnership, good neighborhood relations, shared history, cooperation in cultural, economic, political, security and other spheres and the fact that Russia is one of the co-chairing countries of the OSCE Minsk Group, in terms of possibility and position, this country can play a more decisive role in the fair settlement of the conflict in line with the international law.

“For example, although France and the US are the co-chairing countries of the OSCE Minsk Group, they are relatively far from these processes,” added Mammadov.

Presidents of Russia, Azerbaijan and Armenia, Vladimir Putin, Ilham Aliyev and Serzh Sargsyan adopted a joint statement following the meeting in St. Petersburg June 20.