Azernews.Az

Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov has said Azerbaijan reiterates its "strong support" to fraternal Palestine in its efforts to establish an independent state, with East Jerusalem as its capital, and fully backs Palestine’s bid for a full-fledged United Nations membership.

Addressing an annual meeting of the Organization of the Islamic Cooperation foreign ministers, held on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly, Mammadyarov said Baku "remains concerned" over the situation in Palestine, Azerbaijan’s Foreign Ministry reported.

"We highly value the work of the OIC Secretary General and his staff to consolidate our organization in providing much needed assistance to population in Palestine," he added.

Azerbaijani Deputy Foreign Minister Araz Azimov has recently said Palestine’s territory was occupied and "we cannot turn a blind eye to this". "Moreover, we have told Israel, with which we maintain cooperation and partnership relations, about this," Azimov said.

Regarding the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict over Nagorno Karabakh, Mammadyarov told the OIC ministerial that the Azerbaijani government remains committed to the peaceful settlement of the protracted conflict in line with international law, relevant UN Security Council and OIC resolutions as well as the decisions adopted by the OSCE, Council of Europe and European Parliament.

Minister Mammadyarov thanked the OIC for its support to "the just cause of Azerbaijan in the ongoing armed conflict with Armenia" as a result of which almost 20 percent of Azerbaijan’s territory is occupied by Armenia and around one million Azerbaijanis were ethnically cleansed from their native lands.

"Numerous OIC decisions and resolutions on the aggression of Armenia against Azerbaijan and support of the OIC member states have been instrumental in addressing the occupation of the territories of Azerbaijan by the international community, in particular by the UN General Assembly and the Security Council."

Mammadyarov also said that the UN is "best suited" to meet the global challenges and provide global responses.

"To do so in the most efficient way, the UN needs to be reformed and strengthened to fulfill its mandate and cope with traditional and emerging risks and threats.

"The UN Security Council reform presents significant concern to all member states. The OIC has a legitimate demand for being represented in the Security Council to defend and promote the interests of Muslim countries. We support comprehensive reform of the Security Council to make it more representative, democratic, effective, transparent and accountable to the UN members."

Mammadyarov reminded that Azerbaijan has put forward its candidacy for a non-permanent membership in the UN SC, for the term of 2012-2013, at the elections to be held in October at the 66th session of the UN General Assembly.

"Proceeding from the importance of representing the OIC in the Security Council we rely on the continued support by the member states to the candidacy of Azerbaijan," he said.