SABINE FREIZER: “NAGORNO KARABAKH IS NOT A ‘FROZEN CONLICT'”

Today, Azerbaijan
March 29 2006

Sabine Freizer, Caucasus project director for the International Crisis
Group, said March 28 in Washington that the Nagorno Karabakh conflict
is not a ‘frozen conflict’.

“There are still people being killed regularly,” she underlined.

As many as 19 people, including eight civilians, have been killed in
cease-fire violations over the past month, following inconclusive
peace talks in Rambouillet, France, she said. As many as 90 people
were killed in 2005, Trend repoted.

She said renewed warfare does not seem imminent but could be triggered
by “an unraveling” along the tense, heavily armed confrontation line.

Many of the Armenian-occupied towns outside of Nagorno-Karabakh have
been destroyed and would require substantial rebuilding, Freizer said.

The region is especially sensitive because of its geography. Renewed
military operations in Nagorno Karabakh potentially could involve
Russia, Iran, the Republic of Georgia and Turkey, Freizer said.

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