KOSOVO’S INDEPENDENCE IS DEFINITELY A PRECEDENT, AZERI POLITICAL SCIENTIST CONSIDERS

armradio.am
22.02.2008 16:42

Azeri political scientist Ilgar Mammadov considers that "the
independence of Kosovo is definitely a precedent for the Armenians
of Nagorno Karabakh."

The Director of the Political Research Institute of Baku declared
that "the difference of the conflicts, their history and stages of
development are not essential in this case," Mediamax reports.

"Only the fact of change of state borders over the OSCE territory
against the will of the state is a precedent. If one exclusion can be
made from the European Security Charter (the OSCE Constitution), why
two or three cannot be made then? In the light of the Kosovo precedent,
the Prague Process, in the framework of which Armenia and Azerbaijan
have been negotiating ever since 2004, is becoming more unacceptable
for Baku. The core of that process is as follows: Azerbaijan agrees
to some referendum on the status of the former Autonomous Region of
Nagorno Karabakh, deploys international peacekeepers on its territory,
after which Armenia will start gradually withdrawing its troops from
the occupied territories around Nagorno Karabakh."

Azerbaijan erred at the very beginning, considering itself to be
the winning party in the Prague process. "Really, the rapid pace of
economic development due to oil revenues and the temporary geopolitical
importance caused bilateral vertigo. The Azeri negotiations thought
we lived in a static world, where the international law would
permanently stand for territorial integrity, and in 10-15 it would
be relatively easier to relieve the burden of the referendum on the
status of the former Autonomous Region of Nagorno Karabakh. However,
the events in Kosovo show that it’s not that easy to refuse from
commitments. First of all, it refers to the issue of peacekeepers,
which deprived Serbia of the last physical and political opportunity
to prevent the independence of Kosovo," Ilgar Mammadov declared.