NAGORNO-KARABAKH OFF UN GENERAL ASSEMBLY AGENDA – MINSK GROUP
RIA Novosti
20:48 | 17/ 09/ 2007
Russia
YEREVAN, September 17 (RIA Novosti) – The OSCE Minsk Group aimed
at solving the dispute over the Nagorno-Karabakh region consider it
inappropriate to include the issue on the UN General Assembly agenda,
a Russian official said Monday.
"Each side can introduce any issue to the UN General Assembly
agenda. But decisions will only be advisory if a conclusion is made
at all," Yuri Merzlyakov, Russia’s co-chairman of the OSCE Minsk
Group, said commenting on the GUAM initiative (a grouping of four
former Soviet republics – Georgia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan and Moldova)
to raise the issue of frozen conflicts in the former Soviet Union.
The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) Minsk
Group was created in 1992 to encourage a peaceful resolution to the
conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh.
The group is co-chaired by U.S., Russian and French representatives.
Bernard Fasier, the French co-chairman, said that to settle the
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict painstaking and thorough planning is required
instead of staging a show.
The French diplomat added that the format for the talks on conflict
resolution would not change in the near future.
The conflict between the two former Soviet republics over
Nagorno-Karabakh, a region in Azerbaijan with a largely Armenian
population, first erupted in 1988 when it claimed independence from
Azerbaijan to join Armenia.
Over 30,000 people were killed on both sides between 1988 and 1994,
and over 100 died following a 1994 ceasefire. Nagorno-Karabakh
remained in Armenian hands, but tensions between Azerbaijan and
Armenia have persisted.