Azernews.Az

The key issue for Armenia's foreign policy in 2008 will be settlement to the long-standing Upper (Nagorno) Garabagh conflict, officials said.
In contrast to some predictions that elections could hamper peace talks, Foreign Minister Vardan Oskanian said the change of power in his country during the presidential poll this year could actually give a new incentive to the negotiating process.
Novosti Armenia news agency quoted Oskanian as saying that the fundamentals of peace talks will be preserved and negotiations continued based on the same principles in 2008.
"We will keep on negotiating based on the principle of self-determination. Upper Garabagh's return to the status quo of the 1980s is impossible," Oskanian said.
The Azerbaijan Foreign Ministry spokesman Khazar Ibrahim has reiterated that talks on settling the Garabagh conflict are being carried out stage by stage.
"First, the occupied territories must be freed, Armenian armed forces withdrawn from Azerbaijani land and Azerbaijani refugees and displaced persons returned there. Afterwards, the Garabagh status issue will be resolved within Azerbaijan's territorial integrity," he said.
Upper Garabagh is an Azerbaijani region occupied by the Armenian forces since a 1994 cease-fire ended separatist hostilities that killed an estimated 30,000 people and ousted about a million out of their homes. The OSCE's team of diplomats, referred to as the Minsk Group, is brokering the peace process.