AZERI, ARMENIAN PRESIDENTS TO MEET WITHIN TWO MONTHS

Interfax
March 4 2009
Russia

A regular round of talks on the Karabakh settlement is to be held
between Azeri President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian President Serzh
Sargsyan within the coming two months, Yuri Marzlyakov, the Russian
co-chairman of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in
Europe’s Minsk Group, said.

"The goal of our visit to the region is to organize the next
meeting between the two presidents. In principle, this goal has
been attained. The meeting will take place in the nearest future
at some international summit, most probably within two months,"
Merzlyakov said.

He said the co-chairmen were pleased that both presidents had backed
this idea.

The U.S. co-chairman Matthew Bryza said at a news conference that
the mediators had not been expecting any serious results from the
current visit. The Minsk Group was trying to step up its efforts to
settle the conflict after the presidents’ talks in Zurich in January,
he said. The talks in Nagorno-Karabakh and in Yerevan were not easy,
but the Armenian leadership and the Minsk Group came to the unanimous
conclusion that the process must be continued, he said.

The Minsk Group met with representatives of civil society in Baku,
in Yerevan and in Khankendi, he said, adding that civil society
grasped the meaning of the Minsk Group’s balanced and carefully
weighed decision, which could seriously further the process.

The French co-chairman Bernard Facier said that the people who resided
in Nagorno-Karabakh before the conflict must be involved in the
talks. This means, he said, that both Armenians and Azeris, who lived
there must take part in the discussions about their future, he said.

"Exactly when this will happen is not known, and no framework has
been found for their participation," the French diplomat said.

He said the talks on the settlement of the conflict rest on three
principles: non-use of force and the repudiation of the use of force;
territorial integrity and the right to self determination. "Our goal
is to bring the sides to a solution diplomatically by combining these
principles," he said.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress