Russian mediator says latest round of Armenian-Azeri talks “reassuring”

Trend news agency
22 Jun 05

Baku, 22 June: “New reassuring prospects” emerged during the Paris
negotiations of 16-18 June between the Azerbaijani and Armenian
foreign ministers to resolve the Nagornyy Karabakh conflict, the
Russian co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group, Yuriy Merzlyakov, has told
Trend.

The OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs agree that the meeting between Elmar
Mammadyarov and Vardan Oskanyan was “very positive”.

“The positive impetus given by the meeting of the two countries’
presidents in Warsaw is still there. The negotiations will be
continued during our visit to the region, which will apparently start
on 10 July,” the diplomat said.

Merzlyakov added that there were issues in the negotiations whose
discussion “did not go smoothly”.

“The sides could not agree on a number of issues, otherwise the
discussions could have been stopped,” he added.

Asked whether anything was being done to draft a certain document on
the Nagornyy Karabakh settlement, the diplomat said: “Work is
currently under way on the foundation of the settlement, i.e. what the
document will be based on and what its key components will be. The
document itself will be prepared by expert delegations. When the sides
agree on general principles of it, they will start meeting and working
together.”

Merzlyakov added that it was up to the parties to the conflict to
determine who will head the expert delegations – special presidential
representatives or deputy foreign ministers.

Merzlyakov also commented on the statements that the next meeting of
the Azerbaijani and Armenian presidents would take place on the
sidelines of the CIS summit in Kazan scheduled for 27 August.

“I cannot say this for certain because we need to have this confirmed
by the presidents during our visit to the region,” he said.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress