Azernews.Az

By Sara Rajabova

Azerbaijani member of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly Bureau calls for territorial integrity and the internationally recognized borders of Ukraine.

Deputy Chairman of the Ggeneral Committee on Security and Political Issues of the organization Azay Guliyev delivered a speech at a meeting of the OSCE PA Bureau in Copenhagen, the Azerbaijani parliament told Trend on April 8.

Guliyev stressed that international organizations are responsible for the current crisis.

A change of power took place in Ukraine on February 22. The Verkhovna Rada (parliament) ousted President Viktor Yanukovych from power, changed the constitution and scheduled presidential elections for May 25. A number of provinces in eastern and southern Ukraine, as well as the Crimea did not recognize the legitimacy of the Rada and decided to hold a referendum on the future of the regions.

The vast majority of residents of Crimea - 96 percent - voted to secede from Ukraine and rejoin Russia, in a referendum held March 16.

On March 18, Russia and Crimea signed an agreement on Crimea as well as Sevastopol city joining the Russian Federation.

"If the OSCE and other international organizations had achieved the timely and fair settlement of the inter-state conflicts in the region, and in particular the Armenian- Azerbaijani Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and ensured the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan by making the categorical decisions, we would not have witnessed the current situation," he said.

The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict emerged in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. Since a lengthy war in the early 1990s that displaced over one million Azerbaijanis, Armenian armed forces have occupied over 20 percent of Azerbaijan's internationally recognized territory, including Nagorno-Karabakh and seven adjacent regions. The UN Security Council's four resolutions on Armenian withdrawal have not been enforced to this day.

Peace talks, mediated by Russia, France and the U.S. through the OSCE Minsk Group, are underway on the basis of a peace outline proposed by the Minsk Group co-chairs and dubbed the Madrid Principles. The negotiations have been largely fruitless so far.

Guliyev said that at present many people talk about gross violation of international law. "But unfortunately, despite the fact that we have been talking about this for over 20 years, no one pays attention to it," Guliyev noted.

"The current tense situation is a test for the OSCE. It is necessary to prepare a roadmap and to take bold decisions to cope with the situation," he added.

Guliyev proposed to add two important points to the draft resolution prepared by the rapporteur of the OSCE PA Committee on Security and Political Affairs Pia Kauma.

He proposed that the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly needs to reject legally any attempts to give legitimacy to the so-called referendums held with one country's purpose of occupying another country's territory under the guise of ensuring the right of peoples to self-determination.

"If one looks at the history of all conflicts in the OSCE area, one will see that they all have started with fake referendums," he said.

Guliyev said the OSCE must openly stress that such referendums must be held as part of the constitution and the laws of the member-states and prevent the separatist activity.

Guliyev's second proposal was to stress the importance of the OSCE member-states' respect for the territorial integrity and sovereignty of each other in a separate item of the resolution.

He also emphasized the importance of cooperation with the institutes of the civil society to solve the existing problems and improvement of the role of the countries' parliaments in such processes.