UNITED STATES MADE SUKHUMI, TSKHINVALI, AND STEPANAKERT HAPPY; BAKU SAYS THE AMERICANS ARE "WRONG"
by Arkady Dubnov
WPS Agency
DEFENSE and SECURITY (Russia)
August 6, 2008 Wednesday
Russia
BAKU IS DISSATISFIED WITH MATTHEW BRYZA’S STATEMENT MADE AFTER THE
NAGORNO-KARABAKH SETTLEMENT MEETING; Azerbaijani-Armenian meeting in
Moscow fomented a scandal in Baku.
The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict settlement meeting in Moscow between
foreign ministers Edward Nalbandjan (Armenia) and Elmar Mamedjarov
(Azerbaijan) fomented a scandal in Baku. To be more exact, the scandal
was fomented by the statement Matthew Bryza of the OSCE Minsk Group
made after the meeting.
Nalbandjan said he had discussed "all issues on the agenda" with his
Azerbaijani opposite number.
Mamedjarov’s comment on the meeting was cautiously optimistic. "I’ve
listened to what the Armenian side had to say on the subject," he
said. "Mutual understanding is undeniable, but a breakthrough is
still far in the future."
So benevolent a tone in evaluation of the meeting between the involved
countries is unusual and therefore encouraging.
As soon as Matthew Bryza of the OSCE Minsk Group aired the offers he
himself had allegedly made to the ministers, Baku announced that it
was not ready to accept them.
The scandal was created by the words of the American diplomat to the
effect that "Residents of the Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh themselves
will decide if their republic is to be under Azerbaijani jurisdiction
or sovereign. A referendum will be arranged" (INTERFAX quoted Bryza
as saying).
Baku became immediately alerted to how INTERFAX web site immediate
posted a report on the "undisguised joy in Abkhazia and South Ossetia
over Bryza’s latest statement concerning Nagorno-Karabakh." As a
matter of fact, self-proclaimed republics striving for independence
from Georgia and international recognition will be happy to hear of
even a remote opportunity that Nagorno-Karabakh might become sovereign.
It was Bryza’s reference to Nagorno-Karabakh as a "republic" and the
fact that he allows for the possibility of its sovereignty that made
Baku hit the roof. "A referendum on the status of Nagorno-Karabakh as
part of the Azerbaijani Republic is possible only in 15 or 20 years,"
Novruz Mamedov of the Azerbaijani Presidential Administration’s
International Relations Department said on August 2.