OSCE MG co-chairs voice serious concern over killing of civilians on front line
By Sara Rajabova
The OSCE Minsk group co-chairs have expressed serious concern over growing tensions and violence along Armenian-Azerbaijani borders including the targeted killings of civilians.
The co-chairs issued a statement on July 23, following their meeting with the Azerbaijani and Armenian foreign ministers in Brussels.
The OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs - Ambassadors Igor Popov (Russia), James Warlick (United States), and Pierre Andrieu (France) met separately with Armenian and Azerbaijani Foreign Ministers, Edward Nalbandian and Elmar Mammadyarov, on July 22 in Brussels.
The Personal Representative of the OSCE Chairperson-in-Office, Ambassador Andrzej Kasprzyk, also attended the meeting.
The co-chairs urged the parties to commit themselves to avoiding casualties and stopping deliberate targeting of villages and the civilian population. They also called on the foreign ministers to defuse tensions and adhere to the terms of the ceasefire.
The ceasefire violations on the contact line of Armenian and Azerbaijani troops have recently intensified. The Armenian armed forces don't hesitate to fire at the civilians living in the villages located near the front line.
Recently, the Armenian militaries killed a resident of Azerbaijan's Tartar region while he was fishing in Tartar River in the Ashagi Chayli village.
Earlier, five civilians were wounded as a result of Armenian armed forces' shelling of the houses and fields in the border villages in late June.
The co-chairs and foreign ministers also discussed possible agenda items for a presidential summit, underscoring the importance of a meeting between the Armenian and Azerbaijani presidents for achieving progress in peace negotiations.
The presidents of the two countries met last time in Vienna and discussed the settlement process of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, which emerged in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan.
The Minsk group co-chairs and foreign ministers also discussed meetings which could take place in New York on the margins of the UN General Assembly.
The co-chairs said they would continue to review possible security confidence building measures and people-to-people programs with the parties. They believe that such programs would build the trust and confidence necessary for a lasting peace.
The co-chairs also briefed the countries of the Minsk Group about the status of peace negotiations in Vienna.
Since a lengthy war in the early 1990s that displaced over one million Azerbaijanis, Armenian armed forces have occupied over 20 percent of Azerbaijan's internationally recognized territory, including Nagorno-Karabakh and seven adjacent regions.
The UN Security Council's four resolutions on Armenian withdrawal have not been enforced to this day.
Peace talks, mediated by Russia, France and the U.S. through the OSCE Minsk Group, are underway on the basis of a peace outline proposed by the Minsk Group co-chairs and dubbed the Madrid Principles. The negotiations have been largely fruitless so far.