MEDIATOR NOTES "VERY SUBSTANTIAL" KARABAKH TALKS HELD IN ARMENIA, AZERBAIJAN

Mediamax
April 27 2009
Armenia

Yerevan, 27 April: OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs expressed hope in Yerevan
today that the meeting between Armenian and Azerbaijani Presidents,
planned for May 7 in Prague, will turn out to be constructive.

Mediamax reports that, speaking at a news conference in Yerevan today,
French co-chair Bernard Fassier did not rule out that talks between
Armenian and Azerbaijani presidents in Saint Petersburg in early June
may follow the meeting in Prague.

The diplomat stated that in the course of the recent week the co-chairs
held a series of quot;very substantialquot; talks in Yerevan and
Baku. According to Bernard Fassier, non-flying weather became the
only reason why the mediators did not manage to visit Stepanakert
[Xankandi, Karabakh’s capital]. Russian, U.S. and French co-chairs
communicated with the president of the Nagornyy Karabakh republic
(NKR) on the phone.

Commenting on the recent interview of the Azerbaijani president to
Russian media, Bernard Fassier described Ilham Aliyev’s statements on
the necessity to guarantee the security of Nagornyy Karabakh residents
as quot;unprecedentedquot;. And U.S. co-chair Matthew Bryza, in his
turn, invited attention to the fact that during the same interview,
the Azerbaijani president quot;for the first time talked about issues
of Nagornyy Karabakh self-governingquot;.

quot;We feel that the Armenian and Azerbaijani presidents strive to
prepare their societies for the necessity to establish good neighborly
relations,quot; the French mediator stated.

Talking about Armenian-Turkish statement, signed on April 22,
Matthew Bryza stated that normalization of relations between Armenia
and Turkey will turn out to be quot;strategically beneficial for
the entire regionquot;. At the same time, answering the question
on possible interrelation between the processes of normalization
of Armenian-Turkish relations and Karabakh conflict settlement,
U.S. diplomat stated that these are quot;processes of different
velocitiesquot;. quot;Our stance is that Armenian-Turkish relations
should be normalized without preconditions,quot; Matthew Bryza and
Bernard Fassier stressed.

The mediators preferred not to talk about the possible dates of
reaching an agreement on the basic principles of the settlement. The
Russian co-chair Yuriy Merzlyakov noted that intensification of the
process is apparent, and his American colleague Matthew Bryza stated
that quot;there are new mood and new opportunities in the region
todayquot; to reach settlement on a tighter timetable.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress