UNRECOGNIZED NAGORNO-KARABAKH HOLDS PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS

ITAR-TASS News Agency, Russia
July 19, 2007 Thursday

Presidential elections are held in the unrecognized Nagorno-Karabakh
republic on Thursday.

About 90,000 citizens are to elect the president for five years.

Five candidates are running for president of the Armenian enclave
of 137,000 – businessman Armen Abgaryan; professor at the Karabakh
University Vanya Avanesyan; Deputy Foreign Minister Masis Mailyan;
Communist party leader Grant Melkumyan; and Major-General Bako Saakyan,
who was National Security Service director before his registration
as a candidate.

Public opinion polls suggest that the main struggle will be between
Mailyan, 40, and Saakyan, 47.

August ends the second five-year term of Nagorno-Karabakh’s President
Arkady Gukasyan, who was elected in 1997 and re-elected in 2002. He
had repeatedly said in the past months that he was not going to run for
the third term, even though experts said the constitution allows that.

Central election commission chief Sergei Nasibyan said 276 polling
stations had been opened in Nagorno-Krarakh. Another polling station
is in Armenia, where Nagorno-Karabakh voters living in the Armenian
capital Yerevan will cast their ballots.

The international community does not acknowledge as valid the
elections in Nagorno-Karabakh republic that has not been recognized
by any state, including Armenia that gives Stepanakert the military
and financial aid.

It is believed in the world the elections could affect settlement
of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, to which the OSCE Minsk Group on
Nagorno-Karabakh co-chaired by Russia, France and the US attends.

There is a conviction in Nagorno-Karabakh that only its elected leader
with the people’ mandate can negotiate settlement.

"Armenia supports Stepanakert’s steps aimed at further democratization
of the country," Foreign Ministry spokesman Vladimir Karapetyan said
on Wednesday.

"The democratization processes in the Nagorno-Karabakh republic,
including the presidential elections, will make a contribution to
development of law and civil institutions," he said.

Azerbaijan’s central election commission called the presidential
elections in Nagorno-Karabakh "illegitimate".

It said "such actions in Nagorno-Karabakh, which is an in inalienable
part of Azerbaijan, contradicts the norms of international law,
the Constitution and laws of the Azerbaijani Republic".

Observers from several states arrived in Nagorno-Karabakh for
monitoring the elections, including three members of the Russian
State Duma lower house of parliament.

Vice Speaker of the Armenian National Assembly, Ishkhan Zakaryan,
leads a delegation of observers from the Armenian parliament.

The Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry said the elections on Nagorno-Karabakh
without the participation of the Azerbaijani population "is a serious
violation of Azerbaijan’s Constitution and of the norms and principles
of international law".

The outgoing president of Nagorno-Karabakh, Arkady Gukasyan, said that
"even if the word community does not formally recognize the elections,
it cannot help noting the democratic conditions in which the elections
are going".

He said he was "absolutely sure that the elections will be honest,
fair and transparent".