UN expects Azeri government to be more involved in helping refugees

ANS TV, Baku
26 Nov 04

Presenter Natavan Babayeva Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev today
received a delegation led by UN High Commissioner for Refugees Ruud
Lubbers.

At a press conference, Lubbers said that UN resolutions are
meaningless if they are not observed.

Correspondent over video of the press conference I highly value the
programmes implemented by the Azerbaijani government to improve the
living conditions of refugees, and this is the cause for the recent
decrease in aid, UN High Commissioner for Refugees Ruud Lubbers said
at the press conference on the results of his visit to the region.

Lubbers with Azeri voice-over It is good that despite facing economic
difficulties Azerbaijan spends its profits from oil on refugees. The
international community is somewhat tired. There are two reasons for
that. First, the international community sees that Azerbaijan has
restored its economic and financial strength. We expect the government
to get more involved in this. In spite of that, we will stay in
Azerbaijan and continue our operations as a UN body and with a limited
budget.

Around 70 humanitarian organizations operate in Azerbaijan but among
them the UN office in Azerbaijan has a special role, the head of the
State Commission for Refugees and Involuntary Migrants, Ali Hasanov,
said. It is with the assistance of this body that programmes worth 66m
dollars are being implemented, he said. There is a need to continue
this cooperation, Hasanov said, because correspondent stops in
mid-sentence :

Hasanov Those territories will sooner or later be freed from
occupation. Those people will start returning. In that case we will
have to ask for and benefit from the international experience of the
UN office.

Correspondent In turn, Lubbers said that the main issue now is
achieving the political settlement of the Nagornyy Karabakh conflict
and returning refugees to their land. But no matter how important
political debates are, they do not help to resolve the conflict, end
of quote. Lubbers also expressed his concern that UN resolutions are
not being implemented.

My task is to help the people who have been subjected to violence,
Lubbers said. He did not forget the 30,000 Armenians living in
Azerbaijan. The Nagornyy Karabakh conflict has worsened their
situation as well and as a humanitarian organization we would like to
help them, he said. Seeing that the idea elicited dissatisfaction from
Azerbaijani journalists, Lubbers said that he was surprised that so
many Armenians live in Azerbaijan. He also added that one may be proud
of Azerbaijan because of the 30,000 Armenians.