OSCE Minsk Group co-chairmen to visit region soon

YEREVAN, June 28. / ARKA /. The OSCE Minsk Group cochairmen from France, Russia and the United States will visit Yerevan, Baku and Nagorno-Karabakh in the coming weeks to ensure the continuation of the talks on the resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, the French Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

"The presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan met on 24 June in the Russian city of Kazan at the invitation of Russian President. The meeting concluded with the signing of a joint statement, which says that the presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan reached a ‘mutual understanding on a number of issues whose resolution would help to create conditions for the approval of the basic principles.”

According to Armenian foreign minister Edward Nalbandian, ‘no breakthrough was made at Kazan because Azerbaijan appeared to be unprepared to accept the latest version of the basic principles of the conflict’s resolution proposed by the three co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group.

Speaking to journalists after the meeting in Kazan Nalbandian said Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev presented “about a dozen changes” in the basic principles which the Armenian side could not accept.

The French foreign ministry’s statement says the outcome of the meeting can not be considered negligible.

"France, together with the co-chairs from the United States and Russia will spare no effort to assist all parties to continue negotiations", - the statement says.

The conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh broke out in 1988 after the predominantly Armenian-populated enclave declared about secession from Azerbaijan As Azerbaijan declared its independence from the Soviet Union and removed the powers held by the enclave's government, the Armenian majority voted in 1991, December 10, to secede from Azerbaijan and in the process proclaimed the enclave the Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh. Full-scale fighting, initiated by Azerbaijan, erupted in the late winter of 1992.

International mediation by several groups including Europe's OSCE’s failed to bring an end resolution that both sides could work with. In the spring of 1993, Armenian forces captured regions outside the enclave itself. By the end of the war in 1994, the Armenians were in full control of most of the enclave and also held and currently control seven regions beyond the administrative borders of Nagorno-Karabakh. Almost 1 million people on both sides have been displaced as a result of the conflict. A Russian- -brokered ceasefire was signed in May 1994 and peace talks, mediated by the OSCE Minsk Group, have been held ever since by Armenia and Azerbaijan.—0--