AZERI PRESIDENT ILHAM ALIYEV HAS PRAISED THE STATE OF AZERBAIJAN’S RELATIONS WITH RUSSIA
Interfax News Agency, Russia
May 15 2008
Azeri President Ilham Aliyev has praised the state of Azerbaijan’s
relations with Russia and has expressed confidence the two countries
will build up their cooperation.
Aliyev was speaking at a meeting in Baku on Wednesday with Russian
Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin, who was also upbeat about
Azeri- Russian relations.
Karasin credited relations between Russia and Azerbaijan with being
dynamic and said the Russian leadership attached great importance to
building up ties between the two countries.
Karasin was on a visit to Baku that included a meeting with Azeri
Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov at which the Russian official
expressed complete support for Azerbaijan’s policy of seeking to
restore its sovereignty over Nagorno-Karabakh, an Armenian-speaking
enclave in Azerbaijan that has been the source of a two-decade conflict
between Azerbaijan and Armenia and is a de facto independent state.
Karasin also said Moscow wanted the Minsk Group, a mediating body
appointed by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe,
to continue to coordinate efforts to settle the Nagorno-Karabakh
conflict.
Mammadyarov told Karasin that bringing Nagorno-Karabakh back under
Azeri control was the only acceptable settlement option and that
it would serve to strengthen stability in the region and improve
relations between its nations.
On Thursday, the Azeri Foreign Ministry argued that a recent visit
by new Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan to Nagorno-Karabakh had made
the conflict settlement process more difficult.
The sooner the Armenian side realizes this the more it will gain for
itself, ministry spokesman Xazar Ibrahim told a briefing in Baku.
Ibrahim said Armenia had not made a single constructive move since
Sargsyan took office.
We still hope that the Armenian leadership will make an accurate
assessment of the situation and take proper measures, the spokesman
said.