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MEDIATORS AGAIN VISIT KARABAKH AMID MORE DEADLY FIGHTING
Lusine Musayelian
Armenialiberty.org
March 5 2012
International mediators have toured the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict zone
amid continuing deadly skirmishes between Armenian and Azerbaijani
forces that left two Azerbaijani soldiers dead at the weekend.
The U.S., Russian and French diplomats co-chairing the OSCE Minsk
Group held talks in Yerevan on Friday, proceeded to Karabakh on
Saturday and were due to arrive in Baku on Monday.
Official sources in Armenia gave few details of their meetings with
President Serzh Sarkisian and Foreign Minister Nalbandian. In a
statement, the Armenian Foreign Ministry said they discussed ways
of implementing understandings reached by Armenia's and Azerbaijan's
presidents at their last meeting hosted by their Russian counterpart
Dmitry Medvedev in Sochi in late January.
The statement quoted Nalbandian as complaining about recent statements
by Azerbaijani leaders which he said "run counter to the agreements
reached at Sochi." It did not elaborate.
In a joint statement with Medvedev issued in the southern Russian
city, Sarkisian and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev pledged to
"accelerate the achievement of an agreement on the Basic Principles"
of a Karabakh settlement put forward by the Minsk Group co-chairs.
They said they also told the mediators to continue working with
the conflicting parties on a mechanism for jointly investigating
ceasefire violations along the "line of contact" around Karabakh and
the Armenian-Azerbaijani border.
The mediators discussed the issue with Karabakh President Bako
Sahakian in Stepanakert on Saturday. But they gave no details of
that discussion.
"We also discussed the situation on the Line of Contact," Robert
Bradtke, the U.S. co-chair, told reporters in the Karabakh capital.
Later on Saturday the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry reported that two
of its soldiers were shot dead overnight at the westernmost section
of Azerbaijan's long border with Armenia. It said Azerbaijani troops
stationed there came under intense automatic gunfire from Armenian
army positions.
The Armenian Defense Ministry blamed the Azerbaijani side for the
incident. "The ceasefire regime is always violated by the Azerbaijani
side," the Regnum news agency quoted ministry spokesman Davit
Karapetian as saying.
Azerbaijani news agencies reported that another Azerbaijani soldier
was gravely wounded early after a truck driven by him hit a landmine
at a frontline section northeast of Karabakh on Monday.
The Armenian-Azerbaijani truce violations appear to have been the main
focus of the mediators' activities in recent months, reflecting their
concerns about the possible resumption of large-scale hostilities
and the parties' lingering differences on the basic principles of
Karabakh peace.
Aliyev and Sarkisian reportedly came close to overcoming those
differences when they met in another Russian city, Kazan, last June.
Prospects for a near-term solution to the Karabakh conflict have
dimmed since then. Forthcoming elections in Armenia and Azerbaijan are
widely seen as another impediment to a breakthrough in the protracted
peace process.
Bradtke insisted in Stepanakert, though, that the difficult search for
a mutually acceptable peace deal will continue despite the elections.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
Lusine Musayelian
Armenialiberty.org
March 5 2012
International mediators have toured the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict zone
amid continuing deadly skirmishes between Armenian and Azerbaijani
forces that left two Azerbaijani soldiers dead at the weekend.
The U.S., Russian and French diplomats co-chairing the OSCE Minsk
Group held talks in Yerevan on Friday, proceeded to Karabakh on
Saturday and were due to arrive in Baku on Monday.
Official sources in Armenia gave few details of their meetings with
President Serzh Sarkisian and Foreign Minister Nalbandian. In a
statement, the Armenian Foreign Ministry said they discussed ways
of implementing understandings reached by Armenia's and Azerbaijan's
presidents at their last meeting hosted by their Russian counterpart
Dmitry Medvedev in Sochi in late January.
The statement quoted Nalbandian as complaining about recent statements
by Azerbaijani leaders which he said "run counter to the agreements
reached at Sochi." It did not elaborate.
In a joint statement with Medvedev issued in the southern Russian
city, Sarkisian and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev pledged to
"accelerate the achievement of an agreement on the Basic Principles"
of a Karabakh settlement put forward by the Minsk Group co-chairs.
They said they also told the mediators to continue working with
the conflicting parties on a mechanism for jointly investigating
ceasefire violations along the "line of contact" around Karabakh and
the Armenian-Azerbaijani border.
The mediators discussed the issue with Karabakh President Bako
Sahakian in Stepanakert on Saturday. But they gave no details of
that discussion.
"We also discussed the situation on the Line of Contact," Robert
Bradtke, the U.S. co-chair, told reporters in the Karabakh capital.
Later on Saturday the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry reported that two
of its soldiers were shot dead overnight at the westernmost section
of Azerbaijan's long border with Armenia. It said Azerbaijani troops
stationed there came under intense automatic gunfire from Armenian
army positions.
The Armenian Defense Ministry blamed the Azerbaijani side for the
incident. "The ceasefire regime is always violated by the Azerbaijani
side," the Regnum news agency quoted ministry spokesman Davit
Karapetian as saying.
Azerbaijani news agencies reported that another Azerbaijani soldier
was gravely wounded early after a truck driven by him hit a landmine
at a frontline section northeast of Karabakh on Monday.
The Armenian-Azerbaijani truce violations appear to have been the main
focus of the mediators' activities in recent months, reflecting their
concerns about the possible resumption of large-scale hostilities
and the parties' lingering differences on the basic principles of
Karabakh peace.
Aliyev and Sarkisian reportedly came close to overcoming those
differences when they met in another Russian city, Kazan, last June.
Prospects for a near-term solution to the Karabakh conflict have
dimmed since then. Forthcoming elections in Armenia and Azerbaijan are
widely seen as another impediment to a breakthrough in the protracted
peace process.
Bradtke insisted in Stepanakert, though, that the difficult search for
a mutually acceptable peace deal will continue despite the elections.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress