ARMENIA AND AZERBAIJAN OFFER VIEWS ON NAGORNO-KARABAKH DURING UN DEBATE
UN News Service
Oct 3 2007
As the United Nations General Assembly continued its high-level debate
today, the Foreign Ministers of Armenia and Azerbaijan expressed
their views on the Nagorno-Karabakh region of Azerbaijan.
Taking the floor first, Vartan Oskanian, the Foreign Minister
of Armenia, noted that the Assembly’s agenda includes an item on
protracted conflicts. "Putting all these conflicts in one pot is
inherently flawed. Our own conflict, Nagorno-Karabakh, does not belong
there. The UN is not the place to address [it] because that issue is
being addressed within the OSCE" – the Organization for Security and
Cooperation in Europe.
"We are negotiating with Azerbaijan and we’re inching towards a
resolution," he said.
He said that the process is evolving. "We have a balanced, solid
document in our hand which addresses not only the core issue but
also the consequential issues, and the two together add up to a
reasonable solution."
At the core of the process, he said, "lies the right of people to
self-determination."
In a subsequent address to the Assembly, the Foreign Minister of
Azerbaijan, Elmar Mammadyarov, said the issue of Nagorno-Karabakh poses
the most serious challenge to the region’s security. "As a result of
the conflict, we are still facing the continued occupation by Armenia
of a significant part (almost 20 per cent) of the international
recognized territories of Azerbaijan," he said.
"We are hosting around 1 million refugees and internally displaced
persons (IDPs) who were ethnically cleansed and brutally expelled
from their homes of origin in Armenia and in the occupied territories
of Azerbaijan."
The negotiations being held in the framework of the OSCE "have not
yielded any results so far," he said.
"And as the time passes the more difficult it is for us to observe
from our side of the line of contact the attempts of the current
Armenian leadership to consolidate the results of occupation of
our territories, destroy everything associated with the Azerbaijani
legacy in these territories and carry out illegal activities thereon,"
he said. "The United Nations shall not tolerate such action."