VAHAN HOVHANESIAN SAYS PA OSCE SESSION FOILED GEORGIAN AND AZERI PLANS

Armenpress

YEREVAN, JULY 10, ARMENPRESS: Deputy parliament chairman Vahan
Hovhanesian from the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (ARF), who is
also head of the Armenian delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly
of the OSCE, back home from the July 3-7 PA OSCE summer session in
Brussels, told a news conference that despite the efforts of Georgia
and Azerbaijan the session passed pro-Armenian resolutions.

Hovhanesian gave an extensive narration of how Georgian and Azerbaijani
delegates had been trying to urge the session to pass a resolution
stipulating that ‘all secessionist republics must return back to who
they belonged before."

He said Georgians and Azeris were also fighting to rule out the
Kosovo and Montenegro conflict resolution models as a precedent for
resolution of other conflicts. He said both proposals were rejected,
instead an Armenian proposal suggesting that Serbia’s demeanor be
commended after Montenegro voted to part with it was adopted.

At the close of its fifteenth annual session the Parliamentary Assembly
of the OSCE elected Goran Lennmarker (Sweden) as its new President,
to serve a one-year term. Over 200 parliamentarians from across the
OSCE region took part in the Session in Brussels, in which the Assembly
also passed the Brussels Declaration which includes recommendations
in the fields of security, economics, environmental affairs and
humanitarian issues.

Hovhanesian also shifted to the Russian decision to close a border
checkpoint on Georgia’s border saying that the Russian decision
hits most Armenian interests. Russia closed the Zemo Larsi border
checkpoint early Saturday morning for an indefinite period, which
has created problems for people traveling between Georgia and Armenia.

"Our Russian counterparts should realize that every step against
Georgia also hurts Armenia’s interests.

Therefore, they should be more flexible and careful," Hovhanesian
said today.