OSCE MG: NAGORNO KARABAKH RESIDENTS SHOULD PLAY KEY ROLE IN DETERMINING THEIR REGION’S STATUS

PanARMENIAN.Net
05.08.2008 14:08 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ The August 1 meeting between Azerbaijani and Armenian
Foreign Ministers in Moscow was positive, according to OSCE Minsk
Group U.S. Co-chair Matthew Bryza.

"Both Elmar Mammadyarov and Edward Nalbandian told a news conference
that their tete-a-tete discussion was held in a positive vein,"
Amb. Bryza said.

He said the Foreign Ministers agreed to continue negotiations under
the aegis of the Minsk Group to bring positions of their countries’
closer, as outlined in the Co-chairs’ November 2007 Madrid Document,
up to a final resolution.

When commenting on his Moscow statement, Bryza said the Co-chairs
proceed from a starting position of recognizing Azerbaijan’s
territorial integrity. "To reach a political settlement of the Nagorno
Karabakh conflict, Armenia and Azerbaijan will eventually have to reach
a compromise on NK’s status. We cannot predict what that compromise
will look like, or when it will emerge. But, the Co-chairs recommend
that the residents of Nagorno Karabakh play a key role in determining
their region’s status through some type of vote in the future,"
he said.

The U.S. mediator supposes that the nature of referendum must be
negotiated by the sides.

"Such a process can only be launched after the return of internally
displaced persons and refugees and can take quite some period of time,"
he said, the Azeri Press Agency reports.