The Biden administration is staging risky peace talks this week between the South Caucasus’s bitter rivals Armenia and Azerbaijan in hopes of avoiding a second major war in Eastern Europe

But

with the two sides far apart.

The conversations first

bring together

the foreign ministers of both countries

together

in a room for several days starting Sunday evening and ending Thursday.

US officials are tight-lipped about whether any progress has been made.

We remain committed to promoting a peaceful future for the South Caucasus, State Department spokesman Vedant Patel said Wednesday. We believe that peace between these two countries is possible. We believe that there is no military solution to this.

But military actions have eclipsed diplomatic gestures in recent months. The two former Soviet republics have been fighting for territory for years. Fighting in 2020 left nearly 7,000 soldiers dead and deadly skirmishes erupted again last month.

At the heart of the dispute is a breakaway enclave in Azerbaijan populated by ethnic Armenians and controlled by pro-Armenian separatists. The disputed region is known to Azerbaijan as Nagorno-Karabakh and to Armenians as Artsakh, a mountainous area slightly larger than Rhode Island.

Russia, the European Union, Turkey and even Iran have once had their fingers in the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan. The United States entered the fray late last year when Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken, on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly meeting in New York, confronted his counterparts, Ararat Mirzoyan of Armenia and Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov, brought together for a first contact.

Blinken oversees this week’s talks with Mirzoyan and Bayramov, who have

consistently

popped up

gloomy, consistently grim face

in photos released from the rendezvous point just outside Washington.

Before the meetings, Blinken spoke to the top leaders of both countries, urging diplomacy but also berating Azerbaijan for blocking access to Nagorno-Karabakh by setting up a checkpoint along the Lachin Corridor, the only land route between Armenia and the disputed enclave.

Armenia claims that the restricted access has denied the population food, medicine and other humanitarian needs.

“We have not parsed our words about the need for the free flow of traffic and people and commerce through the Lachin Corridor,” said Patel. “It stays that way.”

The US is often seen as pro-Armenia, mainly because of its congressional support for great Armenians

–

U.S. Constituencies in Southern California and Elsewhere.

But some US-based pro-Armenian activists criticize the Biden administration for its continued military aid to Azerbaijan and what they see as insufficient humanitarian aid for the Nagorno-Karabakh region.

For our government to truly act as an honest mediator, it must cut off military aid to the aggressor, said Aram Hamparian, executive director of the Armenian National Committee of America. He was not optimistic about the outcome of this week’s meetings.

The Azerbaijani embassy in Washington did not call back for comment.

Alliances in the conflict have shifted over the years. Initially, Russia supported predominantly Christian Armenia over predominantly Muslim Azerbaijan, which had the support of Turkey.

But Russia is now bogged down in its disastrous war against Ukraine and is less able to provide Armenia with arms and other material support, analysts say. Armenia also came in 2020 with heavy losses and

What

forced to cede part of the territory to Azerbaijan under the terms of a Russian-brokered ceasefire.

A report from the US Office of the Director of National Intelligence late last year predicted that Azerbaijan would be the country most likely to renew full-scale conflict in a bid to consolidate and expand gains from 2020.

Armenia is less likely to fight because of the deteriorating state of its military in the aftermath of the 2020 conflict, the report said. The Armenian Armed Forces suffered heavy equipment and personnel losses during the 2020 conflict and has been unable to rebuild due to funding and procurement issues.

That’s allowed

make room

Armenia is more willing to compromise, analysts say, despite what some say has the US in a corner.

While U.S. officials have not discussed the details of the meetings, reports are in Armenian and Azerbaijan

media press

suggest the two countries will sign a normalization pact, which would open the way for renewed ties and broader agreements.