Azernews.Az

By Sara Rajabova

Azerbaijani Defense Minister Safar Abiyev and OSCE Special Representative from Ukraine Andrew Deshitsa discussed the military and political situation in the South Caucasus in Baku on Monday, the Defense Ministry said.

The Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict was also discussed at the meeting.

Deshitsa is visiting Azerbaijan on April 14-15 to discuss the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. Further, he is due to pay a two-day visit to Armenia, which starts on Monday.

Last week, Minister Abiyev met with OSCE Deputy Secretary General Adam Kobieracki.

Focusing on the reasons of the unresolved status of the conflict, the Azerbaijani Defense Minister stressed that to date the four resolutions adopted by the UN on the liberation of Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding regions have not been fulfilled. Abiyev also said more than 20 years of efforts by the mediating OSCE Minsk Group have yielded no results.

The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict emerged in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against the neighboring country. Since a lengthy war between the two South Caucasus countries that displaced over a million Azerbaijanis and ended with the signing of a precarious cease-fire in 1994, Armenian armed forces have occupied over 20 percent of Azerbaijan's internationally recognized territory, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts.

Despite the cease-fire, units of the Armenian armed forces commit armistice breaches on the frontline almost every day.