Trend News Agency, Azerbaijan
June 2 2007

Matthew Bryza: I am Optimistic with the Current Status of
Negotiations

USA, Washington / corr Trend A.Gara / Trend’s interview with US
Ambassador Matthew Bryza, the OSCE Minsk Group co-chair

– Much has been written about your forthcoming tour of the
Nagorno-Karabakh region. When are you planning to visit the region,
what will be the route of the travel and what is the purpose of this
visit?

My trip to Baku and Yerevan will begin this weekend. I am going to
join my co-chairmen and partners – ambassador Fassier from France and
ambassador Merzlyakov from Russia, to conduct the next round of
consultations within the Minsk Group process. We are preparing for
the meetings with the presidents next week in both Baku and Yerevan.
This will be followed by presidents’ own meeting in June 9 at St.
Petersburg, where we hope they will come very close to an agreement
on basic principles of Nagorno-Karabakh settlement that we have been
negotiating for. I will be in Baku on Tuesday and Wednesday and on
Thursday I will visit Yerevan.

What is the framework of presidents’ meeting in St. Petersburg on
June 9 and what can we expect from it?

This meeting is going to take place within the framework of the Minsk
group negotiations. This is one of the meetings that happen
periodically. Last time they met in November and now they are going
to meet again to narrow the remaining differences and talk about
basic principles that the Minsk group co-chairmen have suggested to
them. Hoping that if this meeting is good one in St. Petersburg and
they can agree on the basic principles then this can provide formal
framework for the peace agreement between Azerbaijan and Armenia.

Recently Armenia conducted parliamentary elections. There are various
opinions about the conduct of the elections. In your opinion, what
are the implications of these elections and their results on the
negotiation process?

I do not think that Armenia’s parliamentary elections have any effect
on the negotiations process on the Nagorno-Karabakh issue. As the
pertinent OSCE bodies and we have concluded these elections marked a
step forward in terms of democratic processes in Armenia but still
indicated the need for further progress in democratic reform. They
are significant in terms of Armenia’s own internal political
evolution but I do not think that these elections will have any
effect on Nagorno-Karabakh negotiations.

The Minsk Group chairmen and representatives of other international
organizations expressed their optimism that there can be path
breaking developments towards the resolution of the conflict over
this summer. Do you think that these views reflect the reality of the
situation in the current negotiations?

Actually you are quoting me there; obviously I stand by my own
statement. I was quoted in many Azerbaijani and Armenian publications
that I am optimistic with the current status of negotiations. There
is a chance that if this meeting in St. Petersburg goes well, then
potentially we can see presidents agreeing on the basic principles.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress