Azerbaijani community head, U.S. envoy mull Karabakh conflict
By Abdul Kerimkhanov
Head of Nagorno-Karabakh’s Azerbaijani community Tural Ganjaliyev has discussed the protracted Karabakh conflict with U.S. Ambassador to Azerbaijan.
During the meeting held on January 29 upon the initiative of Ambassador Lee Litzenberge, Ganjaliyev emphasized that the community members are supporters of peaceful settlement of the conflict.
He conveyed to the ambassador the wishes and demands of the community members for the withdrawal of the Armenian armed forces from the occupied territories, the return of all Azerbaijani internally displaced persons to their homes, restoration of the violated fundamental rights and freedoms, including property rights.
In turn, Litzenberger underlined that he is closely following the community’s activities and expressed pleasure with the meeting.
Ganjaliyev further informed that as part of the snap parliamentary elections to be held in February, he has put forward his candidacy from the Khankendi constituency No. 122, and, along with other candidates from this constituency, conducts an election campaign on equal and fair terms in accordance with the requirements of the law.
Baku strengthens the role of the Azerbaijani Community of Nagorno-Karabakh in the negotiation process and wants to ensure equal access to negotiations of the Armenian and Azerbaijani communities in the region.
Karabakh’s Azerbaijani community which was subjected to ethnic cleansing and expulsion from their lands has the legal right to participate in determining the future legal status of Nagorno-Karabakh.
Nagorno-Karabakh is Azerbaijan’s breakaway region which along with seven surrounding regions came under occupation of Armenian forces in a war in the early 1990s. Armenia has not implemented four UN Security Council resolutions on withdrawal of its armed forces from the Nagorno-Karabakh and surrounding regions since the cease-fire agreement was signed in 1994.
The OSCE Minsk Group co-chaired by Russia, the U.S. and France has been negotiating the peaceful resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict for over two decades now. However, their efforts have not yielded any results to this date.
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Abdul Kerimkhanov is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @AbdulKerim94
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