AZERBAIJANI POLITICIANS COMMENT ON CHANGES TO PROVISIONS REGARDING NAGORNO-KARABAKH IN US DEPARTMENT OF STATE’S REPORT

Trend News Agency, Azerbaijan
April 26 2007

Azerbaijan, Baku / corr. Trend S.Ilhamgizi / New changes have been
made to the provisions on the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh
conflict in the initial 2006 State Department Country Reports on
Human Rights Practices. After the protest of Azerbaijan, the sentence
‘Armenian Armed Forces occupies large part of Azerbaijani territories
surrounding Nagorno-Karabakh’ was replaced with a sentence ‘Armenia
continues to occupy the Azerbaijani territory of Nagorno-Karabakh
and seven surrounding Azerbaijani territories’. The politicians of
Azerbaijan comment on this issue.

Former State Consultant, Politician Vafa Guluzade considers that
irrespective of the expressions in the report, the position of the
United States regarding Nagorno-Karabakh is clear and unanimous. "The
USA wants Nagorno-Karabakh conflict to be resolved in favor of
Armenia. However, the USA recognizes the territorial integrity of
Azerbaijan because all gentlemen countries support and respect
the territorial integrity of other countries. At the same time,
the USA and other European countries try that Azerbaijan itself
denies Nagorno-Karabakh. In this case, they will be innocent before
Azerbaijan in this issue," Guluzade said.

According to him, it needs to consider as faults the repeat changes
to the report of the Department of State.

The Chairman of Democratic Reforms Party, Parliamentarian
Asim Mollazade, approaches the issue from the point of view of
US-Azerbaijan strategic partnership. He thinks that the Department
of State’s objective changes to its report result from the issue
that the USA supports the international legal norms and recognizes
the importance of Azerbaijan in the region. "Therefore, I assess
this event as a demonstration of the development prospects of the
US-Azerbaijan partnership and friendship relations. It is already the
second document. Before the US Department of State, the Parliamentary
Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) has adopted documents on
the base of the international law. If all international organizations
demonstrate such fair position, Armenia may be forced to change its
policy and peace may be achieved," Mollazade underlined.

Other politician Rasim Musabeyov assesses the objective changes
in the report as an indicator of Azerbaijan’s strategic importance
for the USA. Musabeyov considers that the issue that American senior
officials and Assistant Secretary of State, Matthew Byrza, refute the
fact that the initial variant of the report has been changed under
the influence of the Armenian lobby testifies his insincerity. "After
this, the Armenians may become more active, but in any cases, the
Department of State will not make changes by getting itself into a
funny situation. On the other hand, unlike Armenia, Azerbaijan has
not financial dependence on the USA," he said.

Armenia has occupied 20% of the Azerbaijani lands including
Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven Districts of the country surrounding
it. Since 1992 to the present time, these territories have been
under the occupation of the Armenian Forces. In 1994, Azerbaijan
and Armenia signed a cease-fire agreement at which time the active
hostilities ended.