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Baku scrutinizes reports on Canadian MP’s visit to occupied territories

24 September 2013 09:50 (UTC+04:00)
Baku scrutinizes reports on Canadian MP’s visit to occupied territories

By Sara Rajabova

Azerbaijani embassy in Canada is scrutinizing the information about an illegal visit by the county's MP Jim Karygiannis to the separatist Nagorno-Karabakh region, Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry spokesman Elman Abdullayev has said.

Abdullayev told a press conference that the Foreign Ministry has already issued relevant instructions to the Azerbaijani embassy.

The reports about the Canadian MP's visit to Azerbaijan's occupied territories were circulated by Armenian media on September 23.

Earlier, four foreign citizens blacklisted by Azerbaijan's Foreign Ministry for illegally visiting the Azerbaijani territories occupied by Armenia were excluded from the list. They pointed out in their appeals to Baku that they had been taken to Azerbaijan's occupied territories by deception.

Besides, California State Assembly Speaker John Perez has refused to visit the occupied territories of Azerbaijan, an informed source told Trend news agency on September 23.

"This indicates that officials of foreign countries no longer yield to persuasion of the Armenians and do not want to be included in the list of "persona non grata" of the Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry who visited the occupied territories," the source said.

Recently, Armenian media reported that a delegation of Californian officials and representatives from the Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA) are expected to visit Nagorno-Karabakh.

Unauthorized visits to Nagorno-Karabakh and other regions of Azerbaijan occupied by Armenia are deemed illegal and individuals paying such visits are included in the "black list" of the Foreign Ministry.

Earlier, the Foreign Ministry released a list of 335 people declared persona non grata over illegal visits to the Armenian-occupied territories.

Azerbaijan has repeatedly warned foreign officials and diplomats over visits to its territories occupied by Armenia, saying this contradicts international law. The Foreign Ministry has stated that such visits, paid without prior notification of the relevant authorities of Azerbaijan, are illegal and damaging to the settlement process on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

A precarious cease-fire has been in place between Azerbaijan and Armenia since a lengthy war in the early 1990s that displaced over a million Azerbaijanis. Armenian armed forces have occupied over 20 percent of Azerbaijan's internationally recognized territory, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts.

The UN Security Council has adopted four resolutions on Armenian withdrawal from the Azerbaijani territory, but they have not been enforced to this day.

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