PROGRESS REPORTED AT ARMENIA-AZERBAIJAN TALKS
Karel Janicek
AP foreign
Thursday May 7 2009
PRAGUE (AP) The presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan made "serious
progress" on Thursday during discussions aimed at resolving their
long-standing dispute over the Nagorno-Karabakh region, a U.S. official
said.
French and Russian mediators at the talks also expressed optimism,
saying the two leaders had tentatively agreed to meet again early
next month in St. Petersburg, Russia.
"On the basis of what we heard from both presidents, we expect to
be in a position to confirm some progress during the next weeks and
months," said Bernard Fassier of France.
Nagorno-Karabakh is an enclave in Azerbaijan that has been under the
control of ethnic Armenian forces since a six-year conflict that
killed about 30,000 people and displaced 1 million before a truce
was reached in 1994.
Turkey closed its border with Armenia in 1993 in support of Azerbaijan
during its conflict with Armenia. Turkey backs Azerbaijan’s claims
to Nagorno-Karabakh, which has a large number of ethnic Armenian
residents.
Presidents Serge Sarkisian of Armenia and Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan
met on Thursday at the residence of the U.S. ambassador in Prague as
Washington and other governments push for a solution to the conflict
over Nagorno-Karabakh.
The presidents "were able in principle to reduce their differences
on the basic principles and … agree on the basic ideas that they
came here to discuss," said Matthew Bryza, U.S. deputy assistant
secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs and co-chairman
of the so-called Minsk Group set up to resolve the problem.
"They do agree on a basic approach," Bryza said. "It’s now up to
us to work actively with the foreign ministers as requested by both
presidents to work through the details and finalize these concepts
that were discussed today.
That’s a positive sign. Today showed us that we are making serious
progress."
Bryza declined to give details about the talks, which also were
attended by the foreign ministers of the two countries.
"There is progress, important progress today, significant progress in
that these difficult points that have been debated and argued over by
the presidents over the last few years are now conceptually agreed,"
he said.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton recently encouraged
Armenia and Azerbaijan to resolve the dispute when she held separate
meetings with them in Washington.
Both presidents were in Prague to attend a summit Thursday during
which the European Union planned to offer aid and trade accords to
six ex-Soviet republics to ease Moscow’s hold over them.