Azernews.Az

The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe has adopted a declaration strongly condemning the so-called municipal elections held in Azerbaijan’s occupied Nagorno Karabakh region where ethnic Armenians are running a self-proclaimed republic.

The declaration, passed at PACE’s fall session, was drafted by member of the Azerbaijani delegation to PACE Ganira Pashayeva and undersigned by MPs of numerous countries.

The document, adopted as a written statement by PACE and announced by the assembly’s president Mevlut Cavusoglu, noted that Armenia continues to occupy 20 percent of the internationally recognized territory of Azerbaijan, a member of PACE.

PACE and the United Nations condemned this occupation in their earlier resolutions urging Armenia to withdraw from the Azerbaijani territories occupied since the 1990s war. Nonetheless, Armenia once again deliberately refused to fulfill the resolutions, and held illegal municipal elections on September 18 in the unrecognized Nagorno Karabakh Republic, which was illegally established in the territories of Azerbaijan, the statement said. It stressed that these illegal elections, running contrary to the legal norms and resolutions adopted by international organizations, dealt a serious blow to the complicated talks between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the Nagorno Karabakh conflict.

The PACE declaration also emphasizes that the so-called elections held by Armenia have been severely condemned by most international organizations. The assembly thereby called on Armenia to stop taking destructive steps, as they also adversely impact and jeopardize the negotiating process on Nagorno Karabakh conflict and aggravate the already tense situation in the region. PACE urged the Armenian authorities to respect international law and take a constructive position in the conflict resolution process.