BAKU’S POSITION DOES NOT HELP ADVANCE NAGORNO-KARABAKH PROBLEM SETTLEMENT – ARMENIAN FOREIGN MINISTER

Interfax
May 13 2009
Russia

The settlement of the Nagorno- Karabakh conflict could be stepped up
if Azerbaijan abandons a destructive approach and stops anti-Armenian
propaganda, the Armenian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

"If the leadership of Azerbaijan abandons destructive approaches
and stops militant and anti-Armenian propaganda, the negotiations
proceeding within the OSCE Minsk Group framework could bring the
parties’ positions closer to each other and help settle the problem,"
the statement quotes Armenian Foreign Minister Eduard Nalbandian
as saying.

The parties were quite close to settling the problem in 2001, "but
this did not happen because of Azerbaijan’s destructive approach and
rejection of agreements that had already been reached," he said.

"The Armenian foreign minister said Azerbaijan’s destructive approach
continued for months in the form of rejection of the Madrid proposals
put forward by the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs in 2007," it said.

Nalbandian also said "Nagorno-Karabakh people’s concern about their
security lay in the foundation of their legitimate right to self-
determination, in response to which Azerbaijan offered force and
ethnic cleansing and switched later to open and large scale aggression
against Nagorno-Karabakh, engaging mercenaries linked to terrorist
organizations in this," it said.