Azernews.Az

KIEV – President Viktor Yanukovich has said Ukraine will make "maximum" efforts to advance a settlement to the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict over Nagorno Karabakh during its OSCE chairmanship in 2013, Ukrainian media reported.

Yanukovich told a news conference with Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan in Kyiv that though his country is not a member of the mediating OSCE Minsk Group, it maintains "very good partnership and friendship as well as trade and economic relations" with both Armenia and Azerbaijan.

"A peaceful solution of this conflict meets our interests," Yanukovich added.

Sargsyan said there could have been a breakthrough in resolving the Nagorno Karabakh conflict at the Russian-brokered meeting in Kazan but it was not achieved.

"I think that at least, one chance was missed," the Armenian president said. "This, however, does not mean the end of the negotiation process, does not mean that we will not continue holding talks. This just means that we have lost this period of time, at least until a new meeting."

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev hosted Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Armenia’s Sargsyan in the Volga city of Kazan on June 24. Both the mediating countries and the conflict parties had urged to sign an agreement on a roadmap of the conflict settlement during the summit, but such a document was not signed.

Azerbaijan and Armenia fought a war over Nagorno Karabakh that emerged before the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union and ended with the signing of a fragile ceasefire in 1994. 20 percent of Azerbaijan’s territory has been under Armenian occupation since the war. OSCE mediators from Russia, the United States and France have led negotiations on Karabakh settlement but little progress has been made so far.