KARABAKH INSISTS ON GREATER SAY IN PEACE TALKS
By Karine Kalantarian

Radio Liberty, Czech Republic
June 7 2007

Nagorno-Karabakh’s leader has called for his unrecognized republic’s
participation in the current peace talks with neighboring Azerbaijan,
warning that it may press Armenia to pull out of the process otherwise.

Arkady Ghukasian, who is due to step down as president next month,
said he had raised the issue of Nagorno-Karabakh’s becoming a party
to the negotiations also during his Thursday meeting with visiting
international mediators.

In an RFE/RL interview he said that the cochairmen of the Minsk Group
of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE)
tasked with brokering a settlement in the Karabakh conflict had asked
the Karabakh side "to help Armenia act in a more constructive manner
during the negotiations."

"I don’t exclude that Karabakh will raise a question [to Armenia]
to quit negotiations as it proceeds from today’s situation and
Azerbaijan’s position," Ghukasian told RFE/RL after an unprecedented
two-hour-long meeting with the French, Russian and U.S. cochairmen
of the Minsk Group.

He reiterated that "it is pointless to negotiate anything without a
specified status of Nagorno-Karabakh" and called the Armenia-Azerbaijan
format of talks "destructive and unrealistic".

Ghukasian downplayed the optimism of international mediators voiced
in recent days ahead of this weekend’s meeting between the presidents
of Armenia and Azerbaijan.

But he added: "I think a negotiator should always be optimistic. If
a negotiator is not optimistic, a positive development is hard to
achieve. But I didn’t get the impression that the mediators expected
the upcoming meeting to be crucial."

The presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan, Robert Kocharian and Ilham
Aliev, are understood to meet on the sidelines of the informal summit
of the Commonwealth of Independent States in Saint-Petersburg on
June 9.

The OSCE Minks Group cochairmen Matthew Bryza of the United States,
Bernard Fassier of France and Yuri Merzlyakov of Russia have been in
active talks with both sides in preparation for the summit. They also
met with Armenia’s President Robert Kocharian and Foreign Minister
Vartan Oskanian in Yerevan on Thursday.

In a press conference in Yerevan tonight US Deputy Assistant
Secretary of State Matthew Bryza said they had "very open, honest and
constructive discussions" in Yerevan and "talked about expressions
of optimism or pessimism."

"When I talk about optimism it reflects my personality. I am an
optimistic person, that’s why I am a diplomat," Bryza said. "I
don’t mean by any means that we anticipate some huge breakthrough in
Saint Petersburg on Saturday. But during this period I have seen a
qualitative change in the quality of the discussions."

The U.S. negotiator said that the Minsk Group has seen discussions that
are "serious, respectful and in which the differences are narrowing
between the sides."

"But the differences are still there," he added. "They require serious
work, plenty more work. And that’s why we are here, because we are
serious about helping to resolve those remaining differences."

Against the backdrop of the continuing consultations, a group of a few
dozen hardliners represented by veterans of the Karabakh war protested
near the OSCE office in Yerevan on Thursday pronouncing against any
peace plan that would involve a return of lands currently held by
Armenian troops. They put their protest in writing and addressed it
to the international peace brokers.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress