EDWARD NALBANDIAN: AZERBAIJAN CONTINUES DISTORTING THE ESSENCE OF THE TALKS
armradio.am
12.05.2010 11:36
The Foreign Minister of Armenia, Edward Nalbandian, participated in the
120th session of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe in
Strasbourg. Delegations from the 47 Council of Europe member states,
five observer countries and international organizations participated
in the sitting.
The issues on agenda included the reforms in the Council of Europe,
the cooperation between the Council of Europe and the European Union,
raising of the efficiency of the activity of the European Court of
Human Rights, etc.
In his speech Minister Nalbandian expressed Armenia’s support for the
reforms under way in the Council of Europe, noting that "Armenia will
continue to actively participate in the organization’s activity." The
Minister informed about the preparation of the forum on democratic
future to be held in Armenia in October under the patronage of the
Council of Europe.
Touching upon the settlement of the Karabakh issue, Edward Nalbandian
said: "The statement on Nagorno Karabakh adopted by the OSCE Foreign
Ministers in Athens emphasizes the non-use of force or the threat of
force, the right of peoples to self-determination and territorial
integration as basic principles of conflict settlement. The same
principles lie in the basis of the Madrid Principles proposed by
the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs in 2007. For over a year Azerbaijan
was rejecting the existence of that document, until they announced
recently that they accept the proposals with certain reservations. If
we try to clarify what Azerbaijan agrees to and what it rejects,
we’ll see that there are a lot of exceptions. Azerbaijan not only
continues distorting the reasons, consequences and the essence of
the conflict, but also uses every opportunity to come forth with a
threat of force on all levels.
Proceeding from the experience of the past years, it becomes obvious
that all Azerbaijani efforts to transfer the issue to other structures
and thus affect the negotiations under way within the framework of
the OSCE Minsk Group are unconstructive. Despite all the obstacles
Azerbaijan creates on the way of resolution of the conflict, Armenia
is resolute to uphold the efforts towards settlement of the conflict
through negotiations."
Turning to the Armenian-Turkish relations, Edward Nalbandian said:
"It was the initiative of the Armenian President to normalize
relations with Turkey. Notwithstanding the difficulties, we started
the process with the mediation of Switzerland, we held talks and
signed the protocols with a mutual understanding that there could be
no preconditions in the process. This position is shared by mediating
and supporting states and the international community, as a whole.
After the protocols were signed, Turkey returned to the language of
preconditions, it had been using before the start of the process and
actually stopped the process of ratification of the protocols in the
Turkish Parliament. That is why the Armenian President decided to
suspend the ratification process in Armenia until Ankara is again
ready to continue the process without preconditions. This decision
was welcomed by the international community," Minister Nalbandian
concluded.