Azer Tag, Azerbaijan State Info Agency
April 19 2004

CONSTITUENT CONFERENCE OF CONGRESS OF EUROPEAN AZERBAIJANIS HELD IN
BERLIN
[April 19, 2004, 16:34:08]

As correspondent of AzerTAj reported, on April 17, constituent
conference of the Congress of Azerbaijanis of Europe (CAE) was held
in well-known Berlin hotel “Hilton”.

The Conference was attended by representatives of the Azerbaijan
communities and Diaspora organizations of Ukraine, the Russian
Federation, Belarus, Sweden, Switzerland, Norway, Denmark, Finland,
Belgium, Austria, Netherlands, France, Spain, Czech, Poland, Romania,
Hungary, Bulgaria, Germany, heads of the Azerbaijan societies
functioning in the US, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Kyrghyzstan, head
of socio-political department of Administration of the President of
Azerbaijan Ali Hasanov, delegation of the State Committee on work
with the Azerbaijanis living in foreign countries, led by chairman of
committee Nazim Ibrahimov, the ambassador of our country in Germany
Huseynaga Sadigov, members of Great National Assembly of Turkey.

In the beginning, the national anthem of the Azerbaijan Republic was
performed.

Memory of the national leader Heydar Aliyev was revered with a moment
of silence.

Opening the conference by opening address, chairman of the State
Committee on Work with the Azerbaijanis living in foreign countries,
Nazim Ibrahimov, named creation of the Congress of Azerbaijanis of
Europe as an important event for association of Diaspora
organizations of this continent. He expressed confidence that the new
structure would carry out purposeful activity in strengthening of
connections of our compatriots living in Europe with their historical
Motherland – Azerbaijan, maintenance of political, spiritual unity
and solidarity between Azerbaijanis of the world.

Mr. Ali Hasanov has read congratulatory message of the President of
Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev to the participants of Conference.

In the first part of the conference, passed under the motto `Modern
Azerbaijan realities – the new stage of development and cooperation’,
have been heard reports of Ali Hasanov, on the topic `Azerbaijan on
the European space – the European states: democracy, secularity,
supremacy of law becomes norm of civil society’, ambassador Huseynaga
Sadigov – `Azerbaijani-German relations at the present stage’,
representative of the Ministry of Economic Development Samad Bashirov
– `Updating and dynamics in the Azerbaijan economy’, the adviser of
vice-president of the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan Eldar Shahbazov
– `Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan – the bridge between the countries of the
Caspian region and Mediterranean’, the leading expert of the Ministry
of Youth, Sports and Tourism Farid Akhundov – `Opportunities of
tourist potential in Azerbaijan’.

In second half, discussed were issues of `Modern state and prospects
of development of the Azerbaijan Diaspora’. The speakers touched the
prospects of development of the Azerbaijan Diaspora, its
participation in the political life of the countries of residing, the
role in settlement of the Armenia-Azerbaijan, Nagorny Karabakh
conflict, relations of the Azerbaijan communities with local state
structures at the decision of problems and cares of our compatriots,
of problems and cares in the field of protection of the rights of
Azerbaijanis in the countries of Europe.

The Conference has discussed the project of the Charter of the
Congress of Azerbaijanis of Europe and elected the directing bodies
of structure – the Central Council and Executive Committee. The
president of Association of Turkish-German businessmen Bahyaddin Gaya
was elected Chairman of the Congress of Azerbaijanis of Europe, and
executive director of All-Russia Azerbaijan congress Natig Agamirov
and chairman of the Congress of Azerbaijanis of Ukraine Ogtay
Efendiyev – vice-chairmen.

After statement of the Congress of Azerbaijanis of Europe, heads of
more than 50 communities and associations have signed the Protocol of
the official consent, and have called societies, associations and
national structures in other countries for cooperation in the name of
our national interests.

The Headquarters and Coordination Secretary of the Congress will
locate in Berlin. After official registration in Germany, the
Congress will receive the right to put before the international
organizations the questions connected to problems of Azerbaijan and
Azerbaijanis.

Chairman of the State Committee on Work with the Azerbaijanis Living
Abroad Nazim Ibrahimov has held a news conference devoted to results
of the Conference.

After the Conference, was organized a concert program of masters of
the art of Azerbaijan.

San Diego Union Tribune, CA
April 19 2004

Turkey seeks talks with Azeris, Armenia on Karabakh

ANKARA – Turkey called Monday for tripartite talks with neighboring
Armenia and Azerbaijan over the disputed territory of
Nagorno-Karabakh in the latest sign that Ankara wants an end to the
long-running row.

Turkey has no diplomatic relations with Armenia because of the tiny
ex-Soviet republic’s occupation of Karabakh, a territory populated by
Christian ethnic Armenians but assigned to mainly Muslim,
Turkic-speaking Azerbaijan in Soviet times.

However the European Union, which Turkey wants to join, and the
United States have both urged Ankara to lift its trade blockade of
Armenia to help promote regional peace. Every aspiring EU member
state is required to seek good relations with all its neighbors.

“In the coming months we predict … a three-way meeting (between
Turkey, Armenia and Azerbaijan),” Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah
Gul told the Anatolian state news agency.

“Putting the (Karabakh) problem in the deep-freeze is wrong because
there is an occupation there. We say this problem should be solved
and we need to discuss the problem to solve it.”

But Gul also ruled out any early lifting of Turkey’s economic
blockade, despite lobbying by Turkish businessmen.

Azeri President Ilham Aliyev won reassurances during a state visit to
Ankara last week that Turkey would make no unilateral moves which
might upset oil-rich Azerbaijan, diplomats said.

Turkey and Azerbaijan share not only close cultural and linguistic
ties but also important energy interests.

An international consortium is building an oil pipeline worth around
$3 billion which is due to start carrying crude from 2005 from the
Caspian Sea to the Turkish port of Ceyhan.

Asked about Gul’s comments, Armenian Foreign Minister Vardan Oskanyan
said his country would not accept Turkey as a mediator in the
Karabakh dispute because it was biased against it.

But speaking at a news conference in Yerevan, he said the three
countries had met before to discuss regional cooperation which had
also touched on bilateral problems such as Karabakh.

“If a similar agenda were offered this time, I see no problem in
(Armenia’s) participation in such talks,” he said.

Gul said the tripartite meeting, if given the go-ahead, would take
place before a planned NATO summit in Istanbul in late June. Armenia
is expected to take part in that meeting as a country with NATO ties.

Oskanyan recently met his Azeri counterpart in Prague and they are
expected to hold fresh talks in May.

About 35,000 people died in six years of fighting over Karabakh which
ended in a 1994 cease-fire. A decade of diplomatic efforts by the
United States, Russia and France to end the deadlock have so far
failed.

(Additional reporting by Hasmik Lazarian in Yerevan)

Interfax
April 19 2004

U.S. wants Karabakh resolved in OSCE Minsk Group format

YEREVAN. April 19 (Interfax) – The United States believes the
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict must be resolved within the framework of
the OSCE Minsk Group, U.S. diplomat Stephen Mann, who was appointed
in early April as co-chair of the group, told a news conference in
Yerevan on Monday.

He said that in acting as the U.S. co-chairman of the group, he will
be guided by the national interests of the United States. Mann
explained that the U.S. wants the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict resolved
through peace talks.

Mann met in Yerevan with Armenian President Robert Kocharian, heads
of defense and security agencies, and the leader of the self-
proclaimed Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh. He said his talks with
Kocharian were warm and useful.

The U.S. official will travel from Yerevan to Tbilisi and Baku for
meetings with the leaders of Georgia and Azerbaijan. <>

New University, CA
April 19 2004

Armenian Genocide:
Affirmation Through Education
by: Taraneh Arhamsadr
Staff Writer

Graphic Illustration By Michelle Le

`Immemorial Muscians,’ a 1997 oil painting by Jacques Aslanian,
conveys a sense of loss among the older generation of Armenians.
Aslanian is known to create art based on his Armenian culture, often
using the topic of exile as a central theme for his work.

Courtesy Of The Armenian Genocide Organization

During the Armenian Genocide, hundreds of thousands of families were
broken. Children were separated from their families and ended up
spending their childhoods in large orphanages.

As inhabitants of a country that allows the free exchange of
knowledge, it is our responsibility to attempt and understand as much
as we can about the world around us. Because of all the negativity
present in our world, some find it easier to shield their eyes from
the pain and suffering, and just go through their daily lives in a
state of ignorant bliss. But it shouldn’t be like this. Upon looking
beyond the high school history books, we find that the most hateful
atrocities passed through time with hardly a whisper. One such
notably horrific event that many know nothing about is the Armenian
genocide – also known as the first holocaust of the 20th century.

Some students believe that a noteworthy cause for the Armenian
genocide in the Ottoman Empire was a rise of nationalism.

Before the late 1800s, Christian Armenians and Muslim Turks lived in
a state of mutual tolerance. But Armenians wished to gain their
independence from the empire, and the fact that the region where they
lived was in between two large Turkish regions – thereby blocking
Turkish domination – made them a much-hated target. For this and many
other reasons, Turkish nationalists began premeditating the perfect
plan to rid their land of these people.

On April 24, 1915, in the early part of World War I, Turkish
nationalists systematically killed hundreds of Armenian community
leaders.

This marked the start of what no one could possibly fathom – the mass
killing of the Armenian population in the Ottoman Empire.

Armenian men were drafted into the army believing that they would
contribute to the war effort, but instead were immediately killed or
worked to death.

After the men were removed from the community, the children, women
and elderly complied with commands to relocate. Led across Anatolia
to reach the Syrian Desert, the trip was not without its hardships.
During the `death march,’ many Armenians were raped, starved and
dehydrated, and many died along the way.

Upon reaching the Syrian Desert, whoever remained was immediately
killed.

Those who were able to escape, usually with help from Turkish
missionaries, usually had lost most of their family members. Children
ended up in orphanages without an identity. Women lost their
husbands, families were destroyed. In all, 1.5 million people were
massacred.

While the people of Turkey do not know much about the actions of
their predecessors, the Turkish government has been going out of
their way for decades to affirm that none of this ever happened.

Mark Levine, a professor in the department of history specializing
Middle Eastern history, feels the people of Turkey have not been
given a chance to learn what really happened because of the
government.

`I think it’s mainly the government and everyone involved with it
that’s mainly preaching the denial ideology,’ Levine said. `Though
[the people of Turkey] are more open to talking about it than they
were in the past, they’re never going to learn anything close to the
truth. It’s not going to be an issue that affects their life on a day
to day basis.’

Many Armenians believe that the Turkish government’s efforts only add
to the insult, because they feel that a solution will never be
reached unless governments own up to their past misdeeds.

This week, the Armenian Student Association at UCI is commemorating
and affirming the event. A small but dedicated group, they have
worked tirelessly to make sure that this horrible tragedy is never
forgotten.

`We just want people to know the history. As [Armenian] youth, we’ve
got to continue the story until people accept it and understand it,’
said first-year applied ecology major and ASA committee member Arda
Arjian.

Arjian worked with other ASA members to get the city of Irvine
involved in this event.

`In the city of Irvine, we passed a proclamation about Armenian
genocide, which I wrote. From now, April 24 is going to be a day of
remembrance for Armenian genocide. We don’t want this to be something
that people forget,’ Arjian said.

It is interesting to find a group of young people who have such a
vested interest in their `mother-culture,’ and this may lay in the
fact that this event is still not too far gone.

`I think it’s passed down from fathers and grandfathers, because many
young people have relatives who passed away in the genocide. One of
the biggest reasons that we’re in America to begin with is because
the genocide took place,’ said cultural director of ASA and graduate
student in mechanical and aerospace engineering Vicken Jermakian.

Students of ASA know that they are entitled to learn about anything
they wish as Americans. But they also understand that any society
will attempt to slant their eyes toward certain events while

downplaying others, and it seems that this event is one that is

lesser-known, compared to, for example, the holocaust that

took place against Jews in World War II.

`To me, it’s not about how much publicity we get compared to other
genocides, because I feel that all of them are important,’ Jermakian
said. `It’s been very hard for modern governments to grasp the fact
that genocide is evil. We want the Armenian genocide to be remembered
so as to prevent future genocides from taking place, by educating
people.’

This week, a variety of events will be taking place to commemorate
the holocaust. Armenian students would like to see their peers
participate and attempt to learn more about what happened.

On Wednesday evening, there will be a candlelight vigil at 7 P.M.
That same day, there will be a display of Armenian dancing at the
Student Center.

An important event which students should try and attend is a
screening of Atom Egoyan’s film `Ararat’ on Monday evening at 8 P.M.
in HIB 100.

`This movie depicts some of the minor atrocities of the Armenian
genocide. It will help those who know nothing about the genocide. It
gives people a good stepping stone and an idea of what happened when
everyone turned their backs,’ Arjian said.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

The Daily Star, Lebanon
April 20 2004

In the aftermath of the Armenian Genocide
Film depicts a fragile history after tragedy

Information Minister Samaha said more such documentaries should be
made on the history of Lebanon’s various communities

By Nada Raad
Daily Star staff

A documentary on the Armenian community in Lebanon that airs this
Friday evening on the Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation (LBC) will
shed light on the history of their presence here, which, according to
the producer Carmen Labaki, began well before the 1915 Genocide.

The documentary, “Armenians in Lebanon” was filmed in Armenia,
Turkey, Syria, and Lebanon in an attempt to illustrate the Armenian
history and show their “dispersal” following the 1915 Genocide, which
left more than a million dead.

Co-produced by the Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation International
(LBCI), the 85-minute documentary will be broadcast on LBC on Friday
after the 8 p.m. news report, and one day ahead of the Armenian
Genocide Remembrance Day on April 24.

Labaki, who spent one year working on the film, said that she decided
to shoot the documentary after realizing that Armenian history is
unknown by many here, including some Armenians. Labaki, who
previously produced two documentaries – “Brazil in Lebanon,” released
in 1997, and “France in Lebanon,” released in 2001 – said that the
scene which most touched her concerns the shooting of the Bedouin
Armenians living in the Syrian Desert.

“Every Bedouin Armenian living in Syria has a story to tell about his
parents’ plight,” Labaki said during the documentary’s release on
Monday at the Haigazian University in Beirut. “But the story told by
this second generation does not have the same impact as if it were
told by the generation who lived the genocide,” she added.

The documentary presents Armenian nationals who were uprooted from
their country, their culture and their families and friends, but who
can still list the names of family members. In Syria, many Armenians
are now Muslim Bedouins and have Arab names because they were adopted
by Syrian families.

The documentary shows locations where Armenians were killed and
tortured by the Turks. During the Genocide some were killed in
Armenia while others were killed during a march from Turkey to Syria.
On April 24, 1915, after the Armenians in the army were disarmed and
then killed, the political and intellectual leaders meet the same
fate.

After this event, the remaining Armenians were told they would be
relocated by marching them to concentration camps in the desert
between Jerablus and Deir ez-Zor where they were left without food
and water to starve under the sun.

In a technique common to many documentaries, the producer used
contrasting footage, with scenes of real footage in black and white
abutting contemporary shots of the genocide march.

“We went to Marqadeh in Deir ez-Zor to shoot the documentary. When I
dug in the sand I found bones … from the genocide,” Labaki said.

The documentary was also shot in Shadadeh, an area located in Deir
ez-Zor, where around 300,000 Armenians were put in a cave and burned.

In Syria, many Armenians live in Aleppo, while others left to come to
Lebanon. According to the documentary, the Armenian presence in
Lebanon dates from 1741, when the Armenian Patriarchy was established
in Bzemmar. Following the Genocide, Armenians arrived from Syria and
Turkey in Anjar where some died from cold and illness.

Currently, the Armenian community is concentrated in Bourj Hammoud
and they are well-known for their professionalism in commerce,
jewelry design, carpet making, and crafts.

In 1934, the Armenian community was allowed to vote, and in 1966 some
members assumed ministerial posts.

Currently, the Armenian community is active through three political
parties: the Tashnak Party, the Ramgavar Party, and the Hentchak
Party. In Beirut, four MPs out of the 18 elected members are from the
Armenian community.

The documentary shows that before 1975, members of the Armenian
community here considered themselves as “Armenians living in
Lebanon,” while today they say, “We are Lebanese from an Armenian
origin.” Nonetheless, many members of the Armenian community are
currently returning to their homeland. “Mount Ararat is waiting for
them,” the documentary said.

“We need memory in this country,” Information Minister Michel Samaha
said at the opening. He added that such a documentary should be done
on all the ethnic groups in the country to allow the Lebanese to
learn more about each other.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress

Tacy Ltd., Israel
April 20 2004

ANGOLAN AMBASSADOR CALLS FOR STRENGHTENED RELATIONS WITH ARMENIA

General Roberto Leal Ramos Monteiro “Ngongo”, Angola’s Ambassador to
Armenia, has called for the strengthening of relations between the
two countries in the areas of economy and commerce at a ceremony
where his credential letters were handed over to the local President
Robert Kotcharian.

The ambassador met with the Deputy Foreign Minister, Fatou Markarian,
the Deputy President of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry,
Andranik Aleksayan, and visited the diamond polishing firm Dca, which
is owned by Gagik Abrahamyan.

Monteiro, who is also Ambassador to Azerbadjan, Belorussia, Ukraine,
Moldavia and the Russian Federation, says that the President of
Armenia revealed that Armenia, the ninth global player in diamond
lapidation, is open to initiatives of bilateral cooperation at
company-related level.

The Saratogian, NY
April 20 2004

BALLSTON SPA — The bell rings. The school day is over, but not for
the 22 Ballston Spa Middle schoolers who pile into the school
library.

These energetic and friendly students are members of the Charlotte
Book Award Book Club, the brainchild of three seventh-grade English
teachers: Katie Marcincuk, Jen Hughes and Joe Shaver.

The Charlotte Award is a New York state effort to encourage students
to read outstanding literature and to give them a voice in deciding
which of the nominated books deserve special recognition.

The CBABC in Ballston Spa has been meeting every other week since
Jan. 21, 2004. It was going to disband on April 7, after members
voted and celebrated their own recommendations for the Charlotte
Award. The group, however, has decided to continue.

Today, as the students eagerly greet Marcincuk with comments like:
‘I’m thinking about writing a letter to one of the authors’ and ‘May
I help you set up the snacks?’ I wonder how to bottle and dispense
their enthusiasm to jaded juveniles and apathetic adults.

Not only does the CBABC have school support, it is supported by the
community, as well.

‘The teachers applied and received a grant from the Ballston Spa
Education Foundation,’ says the school’s principal, Helen Stuetzel.

The foundation, comprising Ballston Spa residents, raises money and
provides grants for worthy school projects.

‘We needed the money,’ Stuetzel says, ‘to pay for multiple copies of
the books on the list, so several students could read the books at
one time.’

At this meeting on March 24, the students are gathered to discuss two
books: ‘Forgotten Fire’ by Adam Bagdasarian and ‘The Sisterhood of
the Traveling Pants’ by Ann Brashares. The students have had the
opportunity to read 14 of the 30 nominated books, and they will be
casting ballots for their favorite among these books.

To get things started, Marcincuk, who acts as group moderator, asks:
‘Who read ‘Forgotten Fire?’ Several hands go up at once. ‘Can anyone
give us a brief overview?’

KT Dickman responds with poise: ‘This book tells the story of the
Armenian Holocaust during World War II. A young boy watches as people
in his town and family are taken from their homes to be tortured and
killed. Somehow the boy survives.’

Stacy Machley adds, ‘It was very sad, but also very exciting because
it was true.’

‘And every once in a while,’ offers Taylor Grant-Knight, ‘something
happy would actually happen.’

The general consensus, however, is that ‘Forgotten Fire’ is a hard
book. ‘I tried to read the book a couple of times,’ volunteers
Kristina Mirett. ‘But I just couldn’t get into it.’

Marcincuk sums up: ‘This is a book for mature readers not only
because of the violence but also the story can make the reader feel
very sad.’

Everyone agrees that this is not a book for elementary school
children.

She then introduces the second book for discussion, ‘The Sisterhood
of the Traveling Pants.’

‘We put this book last on the list,’ explains Marcincuk, ‘because it
is long and deals more with mature, contemporary issues than the
other books.’

Alex Ruggiero objects, ‘But the book is so girly.’ Alex is one of six
boys at today’s meeting.

Josh Palumbo concurs: ‘The ‘Rules’ in the book are so stupid. This
must be a humorous or immature book.’

Taylor, also one of the six boys, agrees and disagrees: ‘It took me
days to get through the first four pages, but then shabam! It really
moved.’

Krystal Dee concedes that ‘perhaps the book is more for girls than
for boys.’

I, too, can well imagine how middle school boys might be turned off
by a book that starts with four best girlfriends on a shopping spree.
The book, however, eventually delves into more serious matters such
as divorce and the consequences of sex.

Jessica McDonald says that she ‘can really relate to the character
Carmen.’ Taylor feels the same: ‘I didn’t cry, but I felt sad for
her. She has divorced parents like me.’

Taylor’s assessment of the character named Lena, however, is not so
sympathetic. ‘She was the most boring, and she whined most of the
time.’ But to Taylor, Bridget, the character who is cute and blond,
is another story: ‘I really liked her.’

So did Alex, who admits, ‘I only read the Bridget part of the book.’

Marcincuk looks at the clock and at the table where the cheese puffs,
brownies, cookies, popcorn and soda once stood and knows it’s time to
bring today’s meeting to a close. She and Hughes and Shaver hand out
ballots.

The students make up their minds quickly and stuff their ballots into
the make-shift ballot box.

Before everyone leaves, Marcincuk brings up the idea of continuing
the book group for the rest of the school year. The students are
unanimous in their enthusiasm.

Marcincuk suggests that students bring in books that they
particularly liked. I can hear them suggesting book titles to each
other as they file out.

As I trail out behind them, I reflect on what I’ve just witnessed —
intelligent youngsters engaged in lively yet polite discourse about
books, history, human nature and morality. Though some may have
disagreed with each other, they are willing to listen and even
entertain other points of view. If these children are America’s
future, then I can look forward to it with optimism.

The students who attended the March 24 meeting were Chelsea Ahrens,
Brittany Cain, Leslie Cairns, Brittney Czub, Krystal Dee, KT Dickman,
Stefanie Gentili, Taylor Grant-Knight, Artie Knapp, Kayla Lawrence,
Sarah leBarron, Elizabeth Lincoln, Stacy Machley, Jessica McDonald,
Shannen Menia, Kristina Mirett, Josh Myers, Joshua Palumbo, Chloe
Pecorino, Alex Ruggiero, Mike Venturiello, and Kathy Zink.

Susan Van Raalte’s book club series continues Friday, May 7, on the
cover of the Life section. Thereafter, it will run every other
Friday. If you are in a book club that you would like profiled in
thes series, e-mail Susan Van Raalte at [email protected].

Azer Tag, Azerbaijan
April 20 2004

MINISTERS OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS OF AZERBAIJAN AND ARMENIA ADOPTED
STATEMENT
[April 20, 2004, 11:03:35]

A meeting between Minister of Foreign Affairs of Azerbaijan Elmar
Mammadyarov and Minister of Foreign Affairs of Armenia Vartan
Oskanian took place in Prague, Czech Republic, on April 16.

According to the Foreign Ministry’s press-center, the Ministers
approved a statement for media. The statement says:

`Foreign Minister of Armenia and newly appointed Foreign Minister of
Azerbaijan met April 16, 2004 for the first time in Prague. This
meeting organized by Minsk Group co-chairs allowed the parties to
exchange views on possible ways facilitating the progress. Armenia
and Azerbaijan reaffirmed the interest in settling Nagorno-Garabakh
conflict and expressed consent to continue this dialogue. Foreign
Ministries highly assessed the support of government of Czech
Republic and OSCE’.

Baku Today
April 20 2004

Foreign Ministers To Discuss Nagorno-Karabakh In May

Baku Today 20/04/2004 11:36

The new U.S. co-chair of the OSCE’s Minsk Group, Stephen Mann, said
on Monday that finding a peaceful solution to Nagorno-Karabakh
conflict is in the interests of his government.
“What I will be doing in this position is representing the U.S.
national interests and it is in the American national interest to
work for a peaceful, negotiated settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh
issue,” Mann told reporters while in Yerevan, according to The
Associated Press.

Having discussed the issue of Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenian
diplomats in Yerevan, the U.S. diplomat is due to visit Baku on
Tuesday.
Armenian Foreign Minister Vardan Oskanian said on Monday that he
planned to meet with his Azerbaijani counterpart, Elmar Mammadyarov,
in May.

Oskanian said that the meeting he held last week in Prague with
Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Mamedyarov was useful but did not yield
any result.

Azerbaijan’s former autonomous western region of Nagorno-Karabakh is
home for some 100,000 ethnic-Armenians. The region along with seven
of Azerbaijan’s administrative districts was occupied by Armenian
troops in 1991-94 war.

Major military operations between Armenia and Azerbaijan ended in may
1994 after a cease-fire was signed between the two neighbors. But
despite the cease-fire, shooting still breaks out sporadically across
the line separating Azerbaijan from its occupied territories.

The Minsk Group of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in
Europe has been unsuccessfully mediating between Armenia and
Azerbaijan since 1992 to find a peaceful solution to the conflict.

The Group is led by a troika of diplomats from the United States,
France and Russia.

Interfax
April 20 2004

Baku, Yerevan want peace process to continue

Baku. (Interfax-Azerbaijan) – Armenia and Azerbaijan are interested
in resolving the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, the Azerbaijani Foreign
Ministry said on Monday. The foreign ministers of the two nations met
in Prague on April 16.

“This meeting, which was organized by the co-chairmen of the OSCE
Minsk Group, helped the sides exchange opinions on possible ways of
resolving the situation. Armenia and Azerbaijan reiterated their
mutual interest in resolving the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and agreed
to continue this useful dialogue,” the press service for the
Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry reported, citing a joint statement
issued by the two foreign ministers.

“The foreign ministers highly appreciate the support from the
government of the Czech Republic and the OSCE,” says the statement.

Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mamedyarov told Interfax before
the Prague meeting that it would not address the new proposals made
by the OSCE Minsk Group.

Mamedyarov stressed that Azerbaijan’s main goal is to resolve the
conflict as soon as possible. He added that Azerbaijan does not see
the option of Nagorno-Karabakh joining Armenia as acceptable.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress