A NEW INITIATIVE TO HOLD A MEETING OF ARMENIAN, AZERBAIJANI AND TURKISH PRESIDENTS
By Hakob Chaqrian

AZG Armenian Daily
11/11/2008

Karabakh issue

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev paid an official two-day visit to
Turkey on November 5. He was re-elected as President of Azerbaijan
on October 15 and signed the Maindorf declaration with his Armenian
counterpart Serzh Sargsian on November 2.

Aliyev’s re-election, as well as the signing of the declaration under
the patronage of the Russian President Dmitri Medvedev could attach
importance to the visit. But the impressive victory of Barack Obama
in the US presidential elections focused the attention of the Armenian
press, and Aliyev’s visit remained in the shadow.

It is characteristic that the Turkish press didn’t display a particular
interest in the visit as well. It only underlined that it was the
first official visit of the Azerbaijani President to Turkey after
the latter’s re-election trying to belittle the importance of the
Azerbaijani President’s working visit to Moscow. Contrary to it,
the Azerbaijani opposition taking into account the signing of the
Maindorf declaration conditioned Aliyev’s visit to Turkey by official
Baku’s attempts to win Ankara over.

We would not touch upon Aliyev’s visit, if not Turkish President
Abdullah Gul’s new initiative to hold a trilateral meeting as an
alternative to Moscow meeting. Turkish "Zaman" informed about it
quoting from diplomatic sources, "Ankara is taking recurrent step
towards settlement of the Caucasian issues. We are reaping the fruits
of the diplomatic relations starting up after President Gul’s visit
to Yerevan. Gul will meet the Presidents of Azerbaijan and Armenia
in the nearest future. The first step of the initiative was taken in
Ankara during the President Gul’s meeting with Aliyev. According to
the diplomatic sources, the Azerbaijani President answered positively
to Abdullah Gul’s proposal for holding a trilateral meeting in
Turkey. Ankara will present the proposal to the Armenian side, and then
the place and the date of the meeting will be fixed. According to the
received information, the appropriate place for the trilateral meeting
is Istanbul. Answering to the questions of "Zaman", Azerbaijani Foreign
Minister Elmar Mammadyarov said that Turkey as a hosting country will
decide the agenda and the place of the trilateral meeting. And the
agenda will not be limited to Karabakh issue".

"Zaman" reminds Abdullah Gul’s invitation to Serzh Sargsian to
the football match on October 14, 2009 and then quotes from RA
President’s interview in Brussels, "The exchange visit will depend
on the development of relations between the two countries".