Azerbaijan wants UN to adopt new resolution on Karabakh, leader says

Trend news agency
22 Nov 04

Baku, 22 November: Azerbaijan’s initiative to put the issue of the
“Situation on occupied Azerbaijani territories” on the agenda of the
UN General Assembly is aimed at the adoption of a new resolution,
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev told journalists today.

“Of course, we will not confine ourselves to discussions only. We
want a new resolution to be adopted. A draft resolution has already
been prepared. The Foreign Ministry has held serious consultations
with different countries. We are trying to increase the number of
countries supporting us and I am sure that the resolution will play
an important role in this,” the Azerbaijani president said.

Aliyev described as flippant the Armenian side’s statement that if
the UN adopts a resolution, Azerbaijan will have to hold negotiations
directly with Nagornyy Karabakh.

“Armenia is a party to the conflict and we have already held
negotiations with it. If Azerbaijan is left one-to-one with Nagornyy
Karabakh, we will be able to resolve the issue even more quickly in
other ways. If Armenia wants us to hold talks directly with Karabakh,
then it should depart from the process, withdraw its troops from
the occupied territories and stop allocating funds from its budget,”
Aliyev stressed.

“We don’t think that another organization can replace the OSCE Minsk
Group which is dealing with the problem,” the president said. At the
same time, the participation of other international organizations,
including the UN and the Council of Europe, will not impede the
settlement process and will even “help our common cause”.