Baku denies Azeri, Armenian foreign ministers to meet at NATO HQ

Ekspress, Baku
14 Sep 04

Text of Alakbar Raufoglu report by Azerbaijani newspaper Ekspress
on 14 September entitled “Unexpected visit. Mammadyarov and Oskanyan
are in Brussels”

Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov flew to Brussels
yesterday. Ekspress newspaper has learnt from diplomatic sources
that, during a two-day visit, the foreign minister will have a series
of meetings with the European Union’s enlargement commissioner and
attend a sitting of the EU-Azerbaijan cooperation commission due to
start today.

The minister is also expected to join discussions at NATO headquarters.
Mammadyarov will debate Azerbaijani-NATO cooperation within the
framework of the Partnership for Peace programme with the alliance
leadership.

“The minister is paying a working visit and, therefore, no precise
topic or principal issue is on the agenda,” Foreign Ministry spokesman
Matin Mirza told Ekspress yesterday. He said that Mammadyarov’s
attendance at the sitting of the EU-Azerbaijan commission had been
scheduled in advance and the visit had nothing to do with NATO.

In the meantime, Armenian sources report that Armenian Foreign Minister
Vardan Oskanyan, who was on a visit to Poland, went unexpectedly to
Brussels yesterday. “Mammadyarov and Oskanyan were suddenly invited
to Brussels yesterday to have consultations on the participation
of the Armenian officers in the Cooperative Best Effort – 2004
exercises,” Armenia’s Arka news agency reported. The source claims
that the Brussels talks between Azerbaijani and Armenian experts
on the possibility of the Armenian officers participating in the
Baku-hosted NATO exercises failed. So during Saturday’s discussions,
the representatives of the two countries left the debates and
“therefore, the alliance’s leadership decided to thrash out this
issue at ministerial level”.

“The reports are wide of the mark. There is no way that the Azerbaijani
and Armenian foreign ministers will meet in Brussels in any form,”
Mirza said.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress