OSCE MG CO-CHAIRS REFUSE TO COMMENT ON SITUATION AROUND REPORT OF US DEPARTMENT OF STATE AND STATEMENTS OF AMERICAN CO-CHAIR
Arminfo
2007-05-24 12:10:00
Thursday, speaking a press conference in Yerevan, French and Russian
co-chairs of OSCE Minsk Group on settlement of Karabakh conflict,
Bernard Fassier and Yuri Merzlyakov, refused to comment on the
situation around the report of US Department of State and on the
statements of their American colleague Matthew Bryza.
In response to ArmInfo’s question if the contradiction of the
statements of Mr. Bryza and the acts of US Department of State
discredits the institution of co-chairs, Mr. Merzlyakov replied that
the two co-chairs in the hall "really represent all the three co-
chairs, but they are not empowered to answer the questions regarding
bilateral issues or American bureaucratic systems." He added that
Mr. Bryza explained the situation. "However, I think you’d better
wait two weeks and ask this question to Mr. Bryza when the co-chairs
arrive in the region in full staff," Yuri Merzlyakov said. For his
part, Mr. Fassier also said that the issue is bilateral.
To recap, recently US Department of State has come out with a report
on human rights. The initial report mentioned Nagorny Karabakh as
occupied. The Armenian party applied to the Department and the formula
underwent some changes.
Thus, the report said that the Armenian forces occupy a great part of
Azerbaijani territory adjacent to Nagorny Karabakh. In an interview
with AzerTAg state agency on April 24, Matthew Bryza said that the
statement in the initial version of the report was wrong. He assured
the Azeri agency that the report will not be amended any more. However,
the next day, the report was presented in its initial version under
pressure of Azerbaijan.