Armenian parliament holds hearings on Karabakh conflict settlement
Arminfo
29 Mar 05
Yerevan, 29 March: The two-day open hearings on ways of solving the
Nagornyy Karabakh conflict organized by the permanent foreign
relations commission of the Armenian National Assembly are continuing
in the Armenian parliament today.
Armenian Foreign Minister Vardan Oskanyan, Armenian Defence Minister
Serzh Sarkisyan, representatives of the Armenian presidential
administration, representatives of Armenia’s parliamentary and
non-parliamentary forces, the foreign minister of the Nagornyy
Karabakh Republic [NKR], Arman Melikyan, deputies of the Karabakh
parliament, heads of foreign diplomatic missions accredited in
Yerevan, scientists, as well as Armenian and Russian experts are
taking part in the hearings.
All those who spoke at today’s hearings stressed the importance of
conducting open and large-scale hearings in such an expanded format,
noting that such an event has been organized by a state agency for the
first time in 13 years. “We must be ambitious and seek to join the
European Union, however, on entry into the European family, we should
have no unsettled conflicts,” the speaker of the Armenian National
Assembly, Artur Bagdasaryan, said.
He said the role of parliamentary diplomacy is increasing day by day,
since three international interparliamentary structures – the OSCE,
NATO and the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe [PACE] –
are already discussing the Karabakh problem. He called on the
country’s political forces to disregard narrow party interests and
close ranks around the settlement of the Nagornyy Karabakh conflict.
The head of the foreign relations commission of the Armenian National
Assembly, Armen Rustamyan, said that the hearings will make it
possible to clarify mechanisms of parliamentary diplomacy in order to
solve the conflict as soon as possible, generalize Armenia’s position
on this issue and clarify the place and position of Nagornyy Karabakh
in the negotiating process. Rustamyan also said that organizational
issues of the hearings had been discussed with Armenian President
Robert Kocharyan, who thought it expedient for the Armenian foreign
minister and the National Security Council secretary to present
Yerevan’s official position.
Dissatisfied with Rustamyan’s answer, representatives of the Armenian
opposition demanded that the head of state participate in the
hearings. The representative of the opposition Justice bloc, Shavarsh
Kocharyan, pointed out that it is necessary to draw up a national
concept for solving the Nagornyy Karabakh conflict based on the
self-determination of the NKR. As for the issue of returning the
Armenian-controlled territories, this issue should be solved only by
Nagornyy Karabakh while the democratization of Armenia and Nagornyy
Karabakh will guarantee a fair solution to the Nagornyy Karabakh
conflict.
The head of the commission on defence, national security and interior
issues, MP Mger Shakhgeldyan, spoke about the issue of determining the
NKR’s status and involving it in the negotiating process. The French
ambassador to Armenia, Henry Cuny, also spoke at the hearings and
noted the importance of such discussions, saying that the settlement
of the Nagornyy Karabakh conflict is only the prerogative of its
participants.
The French diplomat stressed the importance of a swift solution to the
conflict in order to ensure Armenia’s economic development and
integration into the international process.