On February 24, Foreign Minister Zohrab Mnatsakanyan met with Miroslav Lajčák, Minister of Foreign and European Affairs of the Slovak Republic, who is in Armenia on an official visit.

Welcoming the Minister of Foreign and European Affairs of Slovakia Miroslav Lajčák, Minister Mnatsakanyan noted: “I am very glad to welcome you back to Yerevan. Over the past year, our Foreign Ministries had a very intense dialogue and we had many opportunities to meet and discuss a number of issues on our common agenda in different formats and on different platforms. We have many programmes to work together.

In the course of this meeting we will participate in a very good and important event - the opening of the Embassy of Slovakia in Armenia. Your visit is a great opportunity to outline together the prospects for further development of cooperation between our nations as well as to outline  the ways of expanding these relations in every field- political, economic, commercial, cultural, educational and other spheres.

Foreign Ministers touched upon the  multilayered agenda of the Armenian-Slovak relations, expressing readiness to continue their efforts to strengthen and expand mutually beneficial cooperation.

In this regard, the two sides appreciated the importance of holding high-level visits and  political consultations between Foreign Ministries, maintaining the dynamics of dialogue on different levels, intensifying contacts in the parliamentary format and decentralized cooperation.

In the context of bilateral economic cooperation, Minister Mnatsakanyan and Miroslav Lajčák stressed their mutual commitment  to take practical measures to make most of the cooperation potential and its unrealized potential in the trade and economic spheres through providing opportunities to immediate actors as well.

Foreign Ministers of Armenia and Slovakia exchanged views on the effective cooperation at international and regional structures. In this context, the maintenance  and development of the dynamics of the dialogue, particularly prevention of genocide, combating Racism and Xenophobia were stressed within the framework of the UN Human Rights Council.

Zohrab Mnatsakanyan and Miroslav Lajčák discussed in detail issues of the Armenia-EU Partnership Agenda, emphasizing the key importance of the Eastern Partnership as a very important platform for inclusive cooperation. Both sides highlighted the launch of the visa liberalization dialogue as an important milestone of promoting contacts between the nations.

During the meeting, the sides touched upon a number of issues of international and regional urgency.

Earlier on the day of the visit the delegation headed by Miroslav Lajčák visited the Armenian Genocide Memorial and paid tribute to the memory of the  innocent victims.