Azernews.Az

By Sara Rajabova

The U.S. co-chairman of the OSCE Minsk Group has appreciated the Paris meeting of Azerbaijani and Armenian presidents as a positive step.

"I think the presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan agree the Paris summit was a positive step, thanks to President Hollande," James Warlick twitted on October 27 after the meeting.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan held a meeting on October 27 with participation of the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairmen to discuss the settlement process of Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. The two presidents held a face to face meeting, which followed by another joint meeting with the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs.

Afterwards, a joint meeting of President Hollande, President Aliyev, and President Sargsyan with the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairmen was held.

The Paris meeting was aimed to resume dialogue between Armenian and Azerbaijani presidents for settling the long-lasting Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, which erupted back in 1988 over Armenia's territorial claims against Azerbaijan.

For over two decades, Azerbaijan and Armenia have been locked in conflict which emerged over Armenia's territorial claims against its South Caucasus neighbor.

Since a war in the early 1990s, Armenian armed forces have occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan's territory, including Nagorno-Karabakh and seven surrounding regions. A fragile ceasefire has been in place since 1994, but long-standing efforts by U.S., Russian and French mediators have been largely fruitless so far.

Armenia has not yet implemented the U.N. Security Council's four resolutions on its pullout from the neighboring country's territories.