Kazakhstan suggests Sargsyan-Aliyev meeting in Astana

26.03.2010 16:07 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Kazakhstan, as the holder of the OSCE Chairmanship,
offers Armenian and Azerbaijani Presidents to meet in Astana.

`We’ll do our best to assist OSCE Minsk Group’s activities towards a
peaceful settlement of Karabakh conflict. We offer the President of
Armenia and Azerbaijan to meet in Astana during the current year,’
Kanat Saudabayev, Kazakh Foreign Minister and OSCE CiO, said during
the meeting of CIS Foreign Ministers in Moscow rbc.ru reported.

On January 1, 2010, Greece passed on the mantle of the OSCE
Chairmanship to Kazakhstan.

The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict broke out back in 1991, when, subsequent
to the demand for self-determination of the Nagorno Karabakh people,
Azerbaijani authorities attempted to resolve the issue through ethnic
cleansings, carried out by Soviet security forces (KGB special units)
under the pretext of the implementation of the passport regime and by
launching of large-scale military operations, which left thousands
dead and caused considerable material damage. A ceasefire agreement
was established in 1994. Negotiations on the settlement of the
conflict are being conducted under the mediation of the OSCE Minsk
Group Co-Chairmen (Russia, USA, France) and on the basis of their
Madrid proposals, presented in November, 2007.

Azerbaijan has not yet implemented the 4 resolutions of the UN
Security Council adopted in 1993, by continuing to provoke arms race
in the region and openly violating on of the basic principles of the
international law non-use of force or threat of force.

The OSCE Minsk Group was created in 1992 to encourage a peaceful,
negotiated resolution to the Nagorno Karabakh conflict. The Minsk
Group is headed by a Co-Chairmanship consisting of France, Russia and
the United States. The main objectives of the Minsk Process are as
follows: Providing an appropriate framework for conflict resolution in
the way of assuring the negotiation process supported by the Minsk
Group; Obtaining conclusion by the Parties of an agreement on the
cessation of the armed conflict in order to permit the convening of
the Minsk Conference; Promoting the peace process by deploying OSCE
multinational peacekeeping forces.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress