Patience running out over Nagorno-Karabakh dispute: Azeri president

Agence France Presse — English
February 14, 2005 Monday

MOSCOW Feb 14 — The president of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, criticized
Monday mediators seeking to resolve a dispute between his country
and Armenia over the enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh, and threatened to
use force.

“We are unhappy with the work of the Minsk group which has failed to
produce any results,” Aliyev said in an interview with the Russian
daily Nezavisimaya Gazeta.

The Minsk Group, comprised of France, Russia and the United States
and operating under a mandate from the Organisation for Security and
Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) has been mediating peace talks between
the two countries for the past decade.

An ethnic Armenian enclave that had a 25 percent Azeri population
before the war, Nagorno-Karabakh was the object of a war between
Armenia and Azerbaijan until 1994 when the active phase of the conflict
ended with Armenia in control of the territory inside Azerbaijan.

Aliyev threatened again on Monday that Azerbaijan would resort to
force to get the territory back.

“The patience of the Azeri people has its limits. We can’t continue to
negotiate for another 10 years. We will strengthen our army,” he said.

He also said he believed other international organisations could help
resolve the conflict.

“That’s why we’ve raised this question in the United Nations and the
Council of Europe despite protests from the Armenians,” he said.

The conflict has cost an estimated 35,000 lives and forced about one
million people on both sides to flee their homes.