Azernews.Az

A senior Azerbaijani official has said there was no need for Baku's harsh protests against the recently-started dialog between Turkey and Armenia that is closely followed by the world community.
"The talks currently under way between the two countries serve to determining the nature of bilateral relations, their history and current state," the head of the President's Office international relations department, Novruz Mammadov, said, adding that Ankara was securing its own interests in its relations with the neighboring country.
The statement comes just days after Ankara confirmed that Turkish senior officials had held a secret meeting with Armenian diplomats in Switzerland. Turkey's confirmation followed a report carried by local Huriyyet newspaper saying the two countries' diplomats had met in Bern on July 8 for talks that lasted several days. The Turkish delegation was headed by a high-ranking Foreign Ministry official.
As for the relations between Azerbaijan and Turkey, Mammadov said the two states are enjoying close ties and have always acted as fraternal nations and strategic partners, and this affected the mentioned developments.
"Overall, even without our insistence, Turkey has attached great importance since the very beginning to the Armenia-Azerbaijan Upper (Nagorno) Garabagh conflict in its relations with Armenia and stated that these ties depend on the resolution of this dispute."
Mammadov said Armenia was striving to achieve opening of the border between the two countries by all means but was unwilling to eliminate the well-known obstacles that stand in the way. He cited such examples as territorial claims against Turkey reflected in the Armenian Constitution and Yerevan's frequent attempts to use the "genocide" claims as tools of pressure on Ankara.
"I believe that Turkey aspires to strike understanding with Armenia and to fairly resolve the situation that has emerged. In some sense, this is a test for Turkey with regard to the promises it has made. But I don't think Turkey will take any steps counter to Azerbaijan's interests," the presidential administration official concluded.
Armenia and Turkey have been at odds and the border between the two countries has been closed since 1993. Ankara has repeatedly made it clear that discussions on forging ties with Yerevan could begin only after Armenia relinquishes its policy of occupation against Azerbaijan and the "Armenian genocide" claims.
Armenia has been occupying over 20% of Azerbaijani territory since the early 1990s in defiance of international law.
Armenians term the 1915 developments in the Ottoman Empire as genocide, a claim strenuously denied by the modern Turkish state.
The Azerbaijan Foreign Ministry spokesman Khazar Ibrahim said his country took Ankara's statements and position as a basis in treating the issue of Turkish-Armenian dialog. "If Turkish officials state that the country's stance remains unchanged, we hope that Ankara's future steps will be based on that policy," he told a news conference Monday.
Ibrahim said that unlike Turkey, the issue concerning the Armenia-Azerbaijan border is very complex as it depends not only on Azerbaijan's will.
"It is common knowledge that most of Azerbaijan's territories bordering on Armenia are under occupation. From this standpoint, even if we seek to open up the border, we can't do it in these conditions. Therefore, the key issue is that Armenia must withdraw its armed forces from our occupied land."
Armenia and Azerbaijan waged a war over the mountainous region of Upper Garabagh in the early 1990s, which claimed some 30,000 lives and displaced about a million Azerbaijanis. The ceasefire accord was signed in 1994, but the OSCE-brokered peace talks have been fruitless so far.

Washington praises dialog
US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Matthew Bryza has said the United States welcomed the start of dialog between Turkey and Armenia.
Bryza told Radio Liberty that he had lately visited the two countries to discuss ways of normalizing Turkish-Armenian relations with their top leaders.
"I can say with confidence that in both Ankara and Yerevan, sincere efforts are being made to normalize ties," Bryza said.
He emphasized that this entails raising bilateral diplomatic, economic and cultural relations to an acceptable level.
"This is a [long] process, and the talks held by Turkish and Armenian diplomats in Bern are the beginning," Bryza said.
He voiced hope that Turkish President Abdullah Gul would accept the Armenian leader Serzh Sarkisian's invitation to attend a World Cup qualifying football match between the two countries' teams coming up in Yerevan. "We hope that President Gul will capitalize on this golden opportunity to move the process forward."
Bryza said Sarkisian had taken "a very courageous step" by extending the invitation and by citing the possibility of setting up a joint commission of historians to research the 1915 developments in Ottoman Turkey.
Sarkisian's invitation is seen as the latest attempt to forge his country's relations with Turkey.
Turkish Foreign Minister Ali Babacan said whether or not the invitation will be accepted depended on the situation that will emerge.