Press TV, Iran
Dec 19 2009

Baku slams US aid to Karabakh separatists
Sat, 19 Dec 2009 14:33:53 GMT

Azerbaijan has officially protested against the allocation of USD 8
million of financial aid to separatists in the Nagorno-Karabakh region
by the US Congress.

Azerbaijan’s Ambassador to Washington Yashar Aliyev forwarded the
complaint to the US State Department on Friday.

The complaint says that such actions by the United States would
negatively affect the negotiation process underway on the
Nagorno-Karabakh issue, Azerbaijan’s Foreign Ministry Spokesman Elkhan
Polukhov told Trend News.

Baku says Washington’s move threatens its sovereignty and territorial
integrity. The formal complaint reportedly suggests that the aid would
be interpreted as the US’ support of the occupation Azerbaijani land.

Meanwhile, a member of Azerbaijan-US Inter-parliamentary Friendship
Group, Nasib Nasibli, said that it was unlikely that the US State
Department will provide a specific response to the Azerbaijani Foreign
Ministry’s complaint.

"I believe the note that the Azerbaijani ambassador presented to the
US State Department will have no specific impact on the US Congress’
decision," the lawmaker said.

The Karabakh conflict is essentially an ethnic and territorial
conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia based on land claims by both
parties. Following six years of war about 20 percent of Azerbaijan’s
land, including seven towns surrounding Karabakh, was occupied in the
conflict.

The armed conflict which broke out in February 1988, ended in a May
1994 truce and efforts to turn the ceasefire into a permanent peace
treaty have so far proven to be of no avail.

In 1992, the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe
(OSCE) Minsk Group was established to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh
conflict. However, the OSCE Minsk Group, compromised of the United
States, France and Russia, is accused of favoring a peace resolution
with the interests of Armenia in mind.