Azernews.Az

By Sara Rajabova

OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs, James Warlick (U.S.), Igor Popov (Russia) and Jacques Faure (France) will visit region in mid-May.

They will firstly visit Yerevan and then Nagorno-Karabakh and Baku, Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov told journalists on May 8.

Mammadyarov pointed out that the visit is aimed at implementing a fact-finding mission. During the visit, the co-chairs will become familiar with the situation in Nagorno-Karabakh.

He also underscored that a letter has been sent to the OSCE Secretary General regarding the accommodation of Syrian refugees in Nagorno-Karabakh.

Commenting on the six conditions proposed by U.S. co-chair Warlick, Mammadyarov said Azerbaijan's territorial integrity is not a subject for negotiations.

He said if, primarily, the Armenian armed forces withdraw from the occupied territories of Azerbaijan, then all the problems can be solved.

Mammadyarov noted that the Azerbaijani side has agreed to begin work on a peace treaty to address the Nagorno-Karabakh problem.

He said the peacekeeping forces should be deployed in these territories as part of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict settlement, noting that there is no trust between the parties and the deployment of peacekeepers for ensuring the safety of the IDPs is a necessary issue.

"If we reach an agreement on a political point of view, we can solve this problem," Mammadyarov said.

U.S. co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group Warlick presented the report "Nagorno-Karabakh: The Keys to a Settlement", while speaking about the conflict resolution at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace on May 7.

He put forth six conditions to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

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.