ARMENIA, AZERBAIJAN IN NEW PEACE TALKS ON ENCLAVE
By Anna Smolchenko (AFP)
Agence France Presse
July 17 2009
France
MOSCOW — The Armenian and Azerbaijani presidents met here Friday in
the latest Moscow-mediated attempt to end a long-simmering dispute
over a separatist enclave where there was a war in the 1990s.
Following their face-to-face talks Friday afternoon, Armenian leader
Serzh Sarkisian and his Azerbaijani counterpart Ilham Aliyev were to
meet with Russian president Dmitry Medvedev on Saturday.
Armenian state-run television quoted Sarkisian as saying earlier
that "no document will be signed" in Moscow over the future of the
Azerbaijani enclave of Nagorny Karabakh.
Keen to burnish its credentials as a powerbroker, Russia has been
mediating talks between the two countries over the enclave, now
controlled by ethnic Armenian separatists backed by Yerevan.
The three leaders last met in Saint Petersburg in June.
Observers praised the two nations’ effort to seek compromise but said
the talks were unlikely to produce any breakthrough.
"The fact that two sides sat down at the negotiating table defuses
tension and increases the probability that the conflict may be settled
by peaceful means," a senior parliament member from the ruling Eni
Azerbaijan party Mubariz Gurbanly told AFP.
"However, one should not expect any tangible result of the meeting
as the Armenian side maintains an unconstructive approach."
Azerbaijani political analyst Eldar Namazov said however the presidents
could lay the foundation for longer-term progress, even if no document
was signed.
"It is a long-term process and in the case any progress is made at
the Moscow meeting Friday and Saturday, we can come, by the end of the
year, to a situation when signature of a certain document is possible."
Armenian analyst Alexander Iskandarian, director of the Caucasus media
institute said: "I do not expect any changes regarding the Karabakh
settlement" from the talks.
"The presidents will make another statement that some progress was
made in the negotiation process."
Armenia’s Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian also indicated that
Yerevan was not in the mood for compromise on the issue.
"Armenia will not make any accords without the consent of the
Karabakh’s people and leadership. Armenia insists that Karabakh must
be a full member of the negotiation process."
At the Group of Eight summit in Italy last week, Russia, France and the
United States issued a statement pledging to continue their support
of the peace talks and calling on Aliyev and Sarkisian to iron out
their disagreements.
Nagorny Karabakh, an enclave of Azerbaijan with a largely ethnic
Armenian population, broke free of Baku’s control in the early 1990s
in a war that killed nearly 30,000 people and forced two million to
flee their homes.
Shootings between Armenian and Azerbaijani forces in the region remain
common despite a 1994 ceasefire.
The three-party meeting has been timed to coincide with an informal
summit of ex-Soviet nations in Moscow on Saturday.