Ukraine backs Minsk Group's efforts on Karabakh conflict settlement
By Sara Rajabova
The Ukrainian Chairmanship lends its full support to efforts of the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs in assisting the parties to find a peaceful solution to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, OSCE Chairperson-in-Office, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Leonid Kozhara has said at a meeting of the UN Security Council.
Kozhara presented the priorities of Ukraine's chairmanship of the OSCE in the politico-military, economic and humanitarian spheres, as well as in the environmental sphere and called the organization that he heads "a reliable partner of the UN in maintaining international peace and security". He noted that the most important task on the agenda of Ukraine is making progress in addressing the conflicts in the OSCE area, the permanent representative of Azerbaijan to UN told Trend news agency.
Touching upon the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict, Kozhara stressed that Ukraine's chairmanship of the OSCE supports the efforts of the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs to resolve the conflict by peaceful means, and said that on June 17-20, during a visit to the South Caucasus region, he will call for a more active negotiations.
The sides cannot sit down at the negotiating table and work out a solution to the conflict for several years, the OSCE chairman told journalists at the UN headquarters, ITAR-TASS reported.
"We want to give an impetus to the negotiation process. We feel that good dynamics are being observed on this issue," he noted.
Kozhara also added that the EU Eastern Partnership program makes a significant contribution to searching for a solution to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.
The Azerbaijani representatve approved the serious attention paid by Ukraine's chairmanship to the conflict resolution in the OSCE area. Noting that the Nagorno-Karabakh region and the adjacent territories are under the occupation of Armenia, he emphasized that resolutions 822, 853, 874, adopted by the Security Council in 1993 in connection with the conflict, recognize the use of military force against Azerbaijan as a serious violation of international law.
The Azerbaijani representative noted with regret that until now the basic requirements of the Security Councilhave not been implemented and the efforts of more than twenty years of mediation within the framework of OSCE have not yielded any results.
According to him, Armenia's attempts to diminish the importance of the Security Council resolutions and deliberately distort the rules and principles of international law, as well as unrealistic aggressive claims of Armenia, are a threat to the settlement of the conflict and dangerous to the international and regional peace and security. In addition, Armenia constantly carries out measures to consolidate the occupation and to prevent the repatriation of more than 700,000 Azerbaijani IDPs.
After visiting the occupied territories in 2005 and 2010 on the initiative of Azerbaijan, an OSCE fact-finding mission identified and documented the facts of illegal activity, including the illegal settlement of people in the occupied territories, changing administrative boundaries and names of districts, the destruction of cultural and religious heritage. However, the recommendations of these missions have remained on paper.
Besides, the illegal activities such as resettlement of Syrian Armenians to Nagorno-Karabakh and other occupied territories of Azerbaijan and the organization of flights to these areas are a clear example of colonization policy in the Azerbaijani lands.
Referring to these facts, the Azerbaijan representative to the OSCE expressed hope that the OSCE chairperson-in-office will insist on an immediate end to all actions which seriously hinder resolution of the conflict through negotiations.
The Azerbaijan representative also stressed that in order to achieve peace, security and stability, first, it is necessary to eliminate the results of the illegal use of force by Armenia and hereby to secure the repatriation of Azerbaijani IDPs and restoration of their property.
The international law and the UN Security Council resolutions require this exactly and it should not be presented as a subject of bargaining in the process of conflict resolution, he added.
Azerbaijan will never make concessions on the issues of its territorial integrity, freedom and the rights of citizens, he emphasized.
In the meantime, the other members of the UN Security Council stressed that the existence of conflicts in the OSCE area, the solution of which was tightened, is unacceptable and noted the importance of their settlement in accordance with the principles and norms of international law, as well as on the basis of the UN Charter.
The Minsk Group, co-chaired by France, the United States and Russia, has been mediating peace talks between Azerbaijan and Armenia since the two South Caucasus republics signed a precarious cease-fire in 1994 following a lengthy war. About 20 percent of Azerbaijani territory has been occupied by Armenian armed forces since then. Peace talks have been largely fruitless so far.