Azernews.Az

BAKU - Neither Azerbaijan nor Armenia are currently willing to reach a settlement to the Upper (Nagorno) Garabagh conflict, an Azerbaijani analyst has said. Arastun Orujlu, the head of East-West research center, was commenting on the recent meeting of the two countries’ foreign ministers.
The meeting between Elmar Mammadyarov and Eduard Nalbandian took place on Saturday in Almaty with the participation of Russian and French Foreign Ministers Sergei Lavrov and Bernard Kouchner and US Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg. No joint statement was adopted at the five-lateral ministerial, though the mediating OSCE Minsk Group’s co-chairing countries issued a statement following the talks.
Orujlu said resolving the Garabagh conflict based on the proposed alternative requires major concessions from the parties. However, the conflict is "on the level of a nationwide issue" in both Azerbaijan and Armenia. It is also "a subject of political rivalry in some sense", therefore, both sides realize that making concessions could trigger a dire political crisis at home, the analyst said.
"Therefore, the sides are refraining from reaching a stage of signing a peace accord by various means," Orujlu said, adding that progress is therefore unlikely to be reached in the peace process in the foreseeable future.
Armenia has been occupying over 20 percent of Azerbaijan's territory since the early 1990s in defiance of international law. The ceasefire accord was signed in 1994. Peace talks are ongoing based on the Madrid principles, an outline for a conflict settlement proposed by the mediators. The updated Madrid Document envisions an Armenian withdrawal from five out of the seven occupied regions surrounding breakaway Nagorno Garabagh after the signing of a peace accord, while the strategic Kalbajar and Lachin regions must be returned within five years thereafter. Azerbaijan stated that it generally accepts the renewed Madrid principles early this year, while the Armenian stance remains unclear.*