Trend News Agency, Azerbaijan
Dec 7 2007
Azerbaijan to Demand Explanations from International Tourist
Organization
07.12.07 17:11
Azerbaijan, Baku / Òrend corr S. Agayeva / Azerbaijan will demands
explanations from the International Tourist Organization, as British
Tour Operator provides tours to the occupied Azerbaijani region of
Nagorno-Karabakh.
Sunvil Discovery ltd, a tour operator in London, offers to British
tourists a 10-day tourist program to Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh,
though British authorities recommend refusing from visiting
Nagorno-Karabakh due to unsettled conflict and skirmishes.
`The Azerbaijani Culture and Tourism Ministry will apply to the
International Tourist Organization (ITO) and will urge to settle the
issue through stopping tours to the occupied Azerbaijani territory,’
the head of the Central Tourism Department at the Ministry Aydin
Ismiyev said on 7 December.
Organization of tours to the occupied Azerbaijani territory
contradicts with the recommendations of the ITO and the international
law. Leaning on that, the Ministry intends to urge ITO to make
serious steps with respect to the tour operator.
`So far we have not had any information about Nagorno-Karabakh
conflict,’ the head of the PR Department of the Sunvil Discovery ltd
Sara Belcher said to Trend. She promised to provide the details of
the tours to Nagorno-Karabakh in near future.Sunvil Discovery, a
member of the British Association of Tour Agencies, has been
functioning as a tour operator since 1970. The British Association of
Tour Agencies said that the company should inform its clients of
where they are going to, but the Association cannot make the company
to annihilate the program.’We cannot interfere with that. That is an
individual choice of the tour operator and his clients,’ the
Association said.The conflict between the two countries of the South
Caucasus began in 1988 due to Armenian territorial claims against
Azerbaijan. Since 1992, Armenian Armed Forces have occupied 20% of
Azerbaijan including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and its seven
surrounding districts. In 1994, Azerbaijan and Armenia signed a
ceasefire agreement at which time the active hostilities ended. The
Co-Chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group ( Russia, France, and the US) are
currently holding peaceful negotiations.