AREAS AROUND KARABAKH CAN BE RETURNED TO AZERBAIJAN

Interfax
March 23 2010
Russia

Armenia will return the territories around Nagorno-Karabakh to
Azerbaijan only after receiving guarantees on the security of
Stepanakert, President Serzh Sargsyan said.

"When the people of Karabakh get the real chance to exercise
their right to self-determination and to create effective security
and development mechanisms, Armenia might consider returning the
territories around Nagorno-Karabakh to Azerbaijan, as a mutual
concession, while preserving Nagorno-Karabakh and, of course, the
corridor linking it to Armenia," Sargsyan said in an interview with
the Syrian Al Watan newspaper, the text of which was released by the
Armenian president’s office on Tuesday.

"I have repeatedly stated this. However, the key element in the notion
of "mutual concession" is the principle of reciprocity, and one has to
realize that in such situations unilateral concessions only aggravate
the existing threats," the Armenian president said.

Baku lost control over Nagorno-Karabakh and seven adjacent areas
during a violent conflict which began in the 1990s between Armenia and
Azerbaijan over the status of Karabakh. As a result, around one million
Azerbaijanis became refugees and displaced persons. Using resolutions
the United Nations Security Council condemned the occupation of the
Azerbaijani territories and demanded the withdrawal of Armenian forces.

Currently, internationally-brokered negotiations on this problem
involve co-chairmen of the OSCE (Organization for Security and
Cooperation in Europe) Minsk Group, consisting of the United States,
Russia and France.

The status of this region is the stumbling block in the Nagorno-
Karabakh talks. In solving this problem, the mediators are trying to
combine two principles of international law: territorial integrity (on
which Baku is relying) and the right of a nation’s self-determination
(Yerevan’s approach).