By Benyamin POGHOSYAN, PhD, Chairman, Center for Political and Economic Strategic Studies

After a break of several months Armenia and Azerbaijan have now resumed their engagement in peace negotiations in earnest. After a face-to-face meeting between leaders in Munich in February, the Armenian and Azerbaijani ministers of foreign affairs went to Washington in early May 2023 to take part in the most intensive round of negotiations ever held since the Spring 2001 Key West summit between Presidents Heydar Aliyev and Robert Kocharyan. The ministers achieved progress, opening the path for the 14 May Brussels summit involving Prime Minister Pashinyan, President Aliyev, and President of the European Union Council Charles Michel. On 19 May, the Armenian and Azerbaijani foreign ministers met in Moscow, and a trilateral Aliyev - Pashinyan - Putin summit was scheduled for 25 May. READ MORE

• May 26, 2023

By Fuad SHAHBAZOV, Baku-based independent regional security and defence analyst

Azerbaijan has adjusted its foreign policy agenda to target the Balkan region that is more vulnerable to the energy crisis than the states of Central and Western Europe.
Energy has long been the core element of Azerbaijan's pragmatic foreign policy, and recently it gained more impetus as European nations sought additional energy suppliers to replace Russian fossil fuel exports. Although the EU’s leading member countries are able to compensate for energy shortages by using energy reserves, employing alternative energy sources and importing additional gas volumes from alternative suppliers, the less developed Balkan states are struggling to adapt to the energy deficit. Azerbaijan has adjusted its foreign policy agenda to target the Balkan region that is more vulnerable to the energy crisis than the states of Central and Western Europe. READ MORE

• May 26, 2023

Moscow says it will maintain control of the weapons, but Ukraine accuses Russia of taking Minsk ‘hostage’.

• May 25, 2023

Al Jazeera’s Defence Editor Alex Gatopoulos on what lies ahead.

• May 25, 2023

The country’s defence ministry says Russian ‘intelligence-gathering’ aircraft spotted near its coasts along the Pacific Ocean and Sea of Japan.

• May 25, 2023

The Syrianisation of the Ukraine war is no coincidence. Russia got away with it once — and believes it will again.

• May 19, 2023

Presence of Ukrainian president is likely to bolster G7 and NATO resolve to continue supplying weapons.

• May 19, 2023

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy calls on the Arab League to help protect ‘our people’ and the Ukrainian Muslim community amid Russia’s war on Ukraine.

• May 19, 2023