ILHAM ALIYEV CALLS FOR INTERNATIONAL PRESSURE ON ARMENIA
news.az
April 8 2010
Azerbaijan
Ilham Aliyev and Toomas Ilves The Azerbaijani president has used
a press conference in Estonia to accuse Armenia of dragging out
settlement of the Karabakh conflict.
The Azerbaijani president met his Estonian counterpart, Toomas Ilves,
in Tallinn yesterday, and told a joint press conference after their
meeting that he had updated Ilves on the state of the Nagorno-Karabakh
settlement process.
‘The fact that our land has been occupied for almost 20 years shows
that, notwithstanding all our efforts for a peaceful resolution of
the conflict on the basis of internationally recognized norms and
UN Security Council resolutions, Armenia’s ongoing non-constructive
position and its policy of dragging out the peace process create
more obstacles to a conflict settlement,’ Aliyev said in his opening
statement to the press conference, as reported by state-run news
agency AzerTAj.
Referring to a settlement proposal by the OSCE Minsk Group mediators,
the president said: ‘The parties acting as mediators in the process,
i.e., the co-chairmen of the Minsk Group, presented to both
sides a proposal to settle the conflict. The proposal is based on
internationally recognized norms and the resolutions and decisions of
international organizations. Overall, Azerbaijan officially and openly
accepted the proposal, with some small exceptions, three months ago.
However, unfortunately, we have not seen the same approach from the
Armenian side. Azerbaijan is ready to move forward with the proposal,
but we have not seen an appropriate response from the Armenian side.
This only increases our suspicions that Armenia simply intends to
maintain the status quo, does not want to withdraw its troops from
the occupied territories, wishes to drag out the process and at a
certain point prefers to avoid it.’
Ilham Aliyev went on to call for pressure to be brought to bear on
Armenia to withdraw from Azerbaijan.
‘I think that the international community and circles involved in the
issue, including European institutions, should step up their efforts
to convince Armenia, which is illegally occupying 20 percent of the
land of a sovereign country, to eliminate the consequences of the
ethnic cleansing of Azerbaijanis and allow one million Azerbaijani
refugees and forced migrants to return home and put an end to the
occupation. After this, peace can be established in the region.’
The OSCE mediators have put forward proposals for a Karabakh settlement
known as the updated Madrid principles.
Azerbaijan’s foreign minister, Elmar Mammadyarov, said earlier in
March that Baku accepted the updated principles in general, but
‘there are elements that do not suit us’.
Armenian Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian said on 29 March that
Armenia had adopted the OSCE’s Madrid principles as a basis for
negotiations two years ago, and the updated principles remained
the same.
The Madrid principles include the return of the territories surrounding
Nagorno-Karabakh to Azerbaijani control, an interim status for Karabakh
providing guarantees for security and self-governance, and the future
determination of the final legal status of Nagorno-Karabakh through
a legally binding expression of will. The status of Karabakh remains
the biggest sticking point in the negotiations.