Karabakh president urges OSCE Minsk group to bring Azerbaijan to constructive track

YEREVAN, November 22. / ARKA /. Nagorno-Karabakh president Bako Sahakyan called on the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs today to take appropriate steps to bring Azerbaijani leadership to the constructive track, Sahakyan’s press service reported.

Sahakyan met today with the international peace brokers Robert Bradtke (USA), Igor Popov (Russia) and Jacques Faure (France) in Stepanakert to discuss the latest developments in the efforts to settle the long-lasting conflict.

Sahakyan was said to have condemned Azeri leadership for glorification of Ramil Safarov, the killer of an Armenian army officer, Gurgen Margarian in Budapest in 2004, politicization of humanitarian issues, Baku’s bellicose rhetoric, adding that this is one of the most serious blows to the negotiation process.

NKR president stressed once again that the official Stepanakert stands for the negotiated settlement of the conflict and restoration of the full format of the negotiation process under the auspices of the OSCE Minsk Group. Sahakyan noted that the settlement of the conflict is possible only in view of the current realities, saying also that any attempt to return to the past will lead to failure. His meeting with the co-chairs was attended by Karabakh foreign minister Karen Mirzoyan, the personal representative of the OSCE chairman-in-office Andrzej Kasprzyk, and other officials.

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-