Hurriyet Daily News, Turkey
Aug 9 2009
Armenia, Azerbaijan inching closer to deal, says Bryza
Sunday, August 9, 2009
YEREVAN – Daily News with wires
Armenia and Azerbaijan are inching closer to a framework agreement on
the long-standing territorial dispute, a top U.S. official has said,
downplaying the significance of changes made in the international
mediators’ existing peace proposals.
Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Matthew Bryza paid a two-day visit
to the Armenian capital, Yerevan, and met with President Serge
Sarkisian, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, or RFE/RL, reported on its
Web site.
Bryza rejected suggestions that the newly modified version of the
proposed basic principles of a Karabakh settlement was less favorable
to the Armenian side than the original document formally put forward
by the OSCE Minsk Group in Madrid in November 2007. Bryza also said
Armenia, Azerbaijan and Turkey had a historical chance to improve
relations, but added that negotiations would resume for several
months.
`The fundamental formulations that are in the Madrid document remain,
and what has changed is a few slight technical points that are
important, of course, but they are technical and in no way
disadvantage either side,’ Bryza told RFE/RL in an interview on
Saturday.
Bryza and fellow Minsk Group co-chairs from Russia and France met in
Krakow, Poland, late last month to prepare what they call an `updated
version’ of the peace plan and thereby try to facilitate its
acceptance by the conflicting parties.
Nagorno-Karabakh is an enclave in Azerbaijan that has been occupied by
Armenian forces since the end of a six-year conflict that left about
30,000 people dead and displaced a million more before a truce was
reached in 1994. Its unilateral independence is not recognized by the
international community.
Sarkisian and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev met last month for
the new round of peace talks in Russia, as the Kremlin cast itself as
a peacemaker after its August war with Georgia. Moscow said Armenia
and Azerbaijan had made progress toward a resolution. Mediators from
the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, or OSCE, who
have been monitoring peacemaking efforts, hope that the two leaders
will finally achieve a breakthrough when they meet again in late
September or early October.
Turkey, which is also involved in normalization talks with Yerevan,
closed its border with Armenia in 1993 in support of Azerbaijan in the
conflict.
Proposed changes:
Bryza discussed the proposed changes in the peace plan with Sarkisian
on Friday and is scheduled to hold similar talks with Azerbaijan’s
Aliyev on Wednesday. `What we did [in Krakow] was try to offer our
best ideas and suggestions on how to bridge the remaining differences
between the presidents based on all of the discussions that have taken
place since the Madrid document was first presented back in November
2007,’ RFE/RL quoted him as saying. `President Sarkisian has strong
views, President [Robert] Kocharian had strong views after Madrid,
President Aliyev has strong views. Discussions have gone up and back
for almost two years, and we took all of those ideas that were put on
the table and tried to bring them together with the co-chairs’ best
effort to make both sides as satisfied as possible.’
Some opposition politicians in Armenia have speculated that the
updated peace proposals call for more Armenian concessions to
Azerbaijan on key issues such as the holding of a future referendum on
self-determination in Nagorno-Karabakh, security guarantees for the
Armenian-controlled territory and the return of refugees. They claim
that there are important differences between the mediating powers’
recent and past statements on Karabakh.
Bryza dismissed those claims as `ridiculous’ and `empty.’ `Certainly
those who are claiming that the update of the Madrid document, based
on what we did in Krakow, somehow disadvantages Armenia ¦ are
operating out of sheer ignorance,’ he said.
Bryza also maintained that the Armenian and Azerbaijani leaders agree
on the `fundamental concept’ behind the compromise settlement favored
by the United States, Russia and France. `But it’s a long distance
from agreeing on the basic concept to actually agreeing or to having a
finalized document,’ he cautioned. Significantly, the U.S. envoy
indicated that Baku and Yerevan are close to agreeing a timetable for
the withdrawal from seven Azerbaijani districts that were partly or
fully occupied by Armenian forces during the 1991-1994 war. According
to some Armenian sources, that was the main stumbling block in
Aliyev’s negotiations with Kocharian.
Sarkisian’s predecessor is said to have insisted that two of those
districts, which are wedged between Armenia and Karabakh, be returned
to Azerbaijan only after the Karabakh referendum. Aliyev rejected that
condition. In a recent televised interview, he said that the Kelbajar
and Lachin districts would be placed back under Azerbaijani control
five years after the start of an Armenian pullout from the other
occupied territories.
`I think they are getting close and maybe they do generally agree on
the timing [of Armenian troop withdrawal,] but there are very
important details that still have to be agreed and can not be agreed
until other associated questions, other elements of the basic
principles are resolved,’ Bryza said. `So I would not say that they
agreed on any of these things, but they are coming closer."