Today. Azerbaijan
June 14 2005
Asim Mollazada: “OSCE Minsk group can’t be replaced with pace
sub-commission on Nagorno-Karabakh”
14 June 2005 [10:12] – Today.Az
The first meeting of the PACE sub-commission on the Nagorno-Karabakh
problem is expected to be held under the summer session of the
Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe in Strasbourg on 20-24
June, MP Asim Mollazada, an Azerbaijani parliamentary representative
to the PACE, told Trend.
Mollazada ruled out the replacement of the OSCE Minsk Group. “This is
absolutely a different format. The CE will not undertake the function
of the OSCE, which acts as mediator in the negotiation process,”
Mollazada underlined. He noted that the CE will attach more and more
attention to issue under its own competence, but namely the rights
of IDPs and provision of the superiority of the law, in particular,
the legal solution to the conflict.
Tofik Zulfugarov, the ex-Foreign Minister, also sees as impossible
the replacement of the Minsk Group with a PACE sub-commission on
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. “I don’t think the sub-commission to
be able to replace the Minsk Group as a negotiation format,” the
political expert underlined. Zulfugarov said that with assistance
of the sub-commission the PACE could syndicate the discussion of
humanitarian issues, linked with Karabakh conflict. In particular,
humanitarian catastrophe that Azerbaijan has faced as a result of
deportation of over 1 million refugees and IDPs from Armenia and
occupied territory of Azerbaijan.
Along with interested sides the sub-commission also included the
representatives from 6 countries – France, Germany, Russia, Italy,
Sweden and Turkey, as well as the chairmen of the PACE committees,
co-rapporteurs of the PACE Monitoring Committee Andreas Gross and
Andreas Herkel, author of the report on Nagorno-Karabakh, David
Atkinson.
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