Monday 10 August 2009

Karabakh News

U.S. KARABAKH ENVOY AGAIN VISITS ARMENIA
Emil Danielyan, Ruben Meloyan
Armenialiberty.org
Aug 7 2009

Washington's top Nagorno-Karabakh negotiator insisted Friday that
Armenia and Azerbaijan remain "very close" to ending their long-running
territorial dispute as he began a fresh tour of the region aimed at
keeping up the momentum in the peace process.

Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Matthew Bryza met President Serzh
Sarkisian to discuss ways of overcoming the conflicting parties'
remaining disagreements over a framework peace accord drafted by the
U.S., Russian and French co-chairs of the Minsk Group. Sarkisian's
office released no details of the meeting.

Sarkisian and his Azerbaijani counterpart, Ilham Aliyev, apparently
failed to bridge their differences during their most recent talks held
in Moscow on July 17-18. The mediators hope that the two leaders will
achieve a breakthrough at their next meeting due in October.

"There was no formal agreement [at Moscow,] but they are very close,"
Bryza said, speaking at a youth forum held in the Armenian resort town
of Tsaghkadzor later in the day. He expressed hope that "we will be
at the point of this agreement on the last few elements of the basic
principles that remain not yet agreed" after the co-chairs visit the
conflict zone in late September.

Bryza and the two other Minsk Group co-chairs met in Krakow, Poland
late last month to prepare what they call an "updated version" of their
proposed basic principles of a Karabakh settlement. The U.S. official
said their consultations were based "what the presidents discussed
in Moscow and what they told us co-chairs after their meeting."

Bryza did not elaborate on the changes made in the mediators'
peace plan. But he did hint that it continues to uphold the Karabakh
Armenians' right to legitimize their secession from Azerbaijan in a
future referendum.

"What I can not tell you today is when the final legal status of
Nagorno-Karabakh will be determined through a vote," Bryza said. "But
you did not hear me say that Nagorno-Karabakh will be returned to
Azerbaijan.

"I never said that. I just said that the interim status will be
determined now and the final legal status will be determined by the
people of Karabakh."
Hurriyet Daily News, Turkey
Aug 9 2009
Armenia, Azerbaijan inching closer to deal, says Bryza
Sunday, August 9, 2009
YEREVAN - Daily News with wires


Armenia and Azerbaijan are inching closer to a framework agreement on
the long-standing territorial dispute, a top U.S. official has said,
downplaying the significance of changes made in the international
mediators' existing peace proposals.

Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Matthew Bryza paid a two-day visit
to the Armenian capital, Yerevan, and met with President Serge
Sarkisian, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, or RFE/RL, reported on its
Web site.

Bryza rejected suggestions that the newly modified version of the
proposed basic principles of a Karabakh settlement was less favorable
to the Armenian side than the original document formally put forward
by the OSCE Minsk Group in Madrid in November 2007. Bryza also said
Armenia, Azerbaijan and Turkey had a historical chance to improve
relations, but added that negotiations would resume for several
months.

`The fundamental formulations that are in the Madrid document remain,
and what has changed is a few slight technical points that are
important, of course, but they are technical and in no way
disadvantage either side,' Bryza told RFE/RL in an interview on
Saturday.

Bryza and fellow Minsk Group co-chairs from Russia and France met in
Krakow, Poland, late last month to prepare what they call an `updated
version' of the peace plan and thereby try to facilitate its
acceptance by the conflicting parties.

Nagorno-Karabakh is an enclave in Azerbaijan that has been occupied by
Armenian forces since the end of a six-year conflict that left about
30,000 people dead and displaced a million more before a truce was
reached in 1994. Its unilateral independence is not recognized by the
international community.

Sarkisian and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev met last month for
the new round of peace talks in Russia, as the Kremlin cast itself as
a peacemaker after its August war with Georgia. Moscow said Armenia
and Azerbaijan had made progress toward a resolution. Mediators from
the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, or OSCE, who
have been monitoring peacemaking efforts, hope that the two leaders
will finally achieve a breakthrough when they meet again in late
September or early October.

Turkey, which is also involved in normalization talks with Yerevan,
closed its border with Armenia in 1993 in support of Azerbaijan in the
conflict.

Proposed changes:

Bryza discussed the proposed changes in the peace plan with Sarkisian
on Friday and is scheduled to hold similar talks with Azerbaijan's
Aliyev on Wednesday. `What we did [in Krakow] was try to offer our
best ideas and suggestions on how to bridge the remaining differences
between the presidents based on all of the discussions that have taken
place since the Madrid document was first presented back in November
2007,' RFE/RL quoted him as saying. `President Sarkisian has strong
views, President [Robert] Kocharian had strong views after Madrid,
President Aliyev has strong views. Discussions have gone up and back
for almost two years, and we took all of those ideas that were put on
the table and tried to bring them together with the co-chairs' best
effort to make both sides as satisfied as possible.'

Some opposition politicians in Armenia have speculated that the
updated peace proposals call for more Armenian concessions to
Azerbaijan on key issues such as the holding of a future referendum on
self-determination in Nagorno-Karabakh, security guarantees for the
Armenian-controlled territory and the return of refugees. They claim
that there are important differences between the mediating powers'
recent and past statements on Karabakh.

Bryza dismissed those claims as `ridiculous' and `empty.' `Certainly
those who are claiming that the update of the Madrid document, based
on what we did in Krakow, somehow disadvantages Armenia ¦ are
operating out of sheer ignorance,' he said.

Bryza also maintained that the Armenian and Azerbaijani leaders agree
on the `fundamental concept' behind the compromise settlement favored
by the United States, Russia and France. `But it's a long distance
from agreeing on the basic concept to actually agreeing or to having a
finalized document,' he cautioned. Significantly, the U.S. envoy
indicated that Baku and Yerevan are close to agreeing a timetable for
the withdrawal from seven Azerbaijani districts that were partly or
fully occupied by Armenian forces during the 1991-1994 war. According
to some Armenian sources, that was the main stumbling block in
Aliyev's negotiations with Kocharian.

Sarkisian's predecessor is said to have insisted that two of those
districts, which are wedged between Armenia and Karabakh, be returned
to Azerbaijan only after the Karabakh referendum. Aliyev rejected that
condition. In a recent televised interview, he said that the Kelbajar
and Lachin districts would be placed back under Azerbaijani control
five years after the start of an Armenian pullout from the other
occupied territories.

`I think they are getting close and maybe they do generally agree on
the timing [of Armenian troop withdrawal,] but there are very
important details that still have to be agreed and can not be agreed
until other associated questions, other elements of the basic
principles are resolved,' Bryza said. `So I would not say that they
agreed on any of these things, but they are coming closer."


DASHNAK LEADER SEES INCREASED PRESSURE ON ARMENIA
Irina Hovannisian
Armenialiberty.org
Aug 7 2009

Turkey's preconditions for normalizing relations with Armenia have
left Yerevan under stronger international pressure to make concessions
in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, a senior member of the Armenian
Revolutionary Federation (Dashnaktsutyun) said on Friday.

Giro Manoyan said the United States and other mediating powers are
pressing the conflicting parties to sign up to their basic principles
of a Karabakh settlement before an October 14 football match in Turkey
which Ankara hopes will be attended by President Serzh Sarkisian.

"Their haste is in effect related to Turkey's precondition that it
will not sign a [normalization] agreement with Armenia until there is
progress on the Nagorno-Karabakh issue," Manoyan told RFE/RL. "As far
as Karabakh is concerned, this haste is against Armenian interests
because it does not stem from the logic of the conflict's resolution."

Dashnaktsutyun, which pulled out of Sarkisian ruling coalition in
April, is strongly opposed to the framework peace accord drafted
by the American, French and Russian mediators co-chairing the OSCE
Minsk Group. The nationalist party has also been highly critical of
Armenia's rapprochement with Turkey that was initiated by Sarkisian.

The dialogue between the two nations gained momentum when Turkish
President Abdullah Gul visited Yerevan last September to watch
the first-ever game between the two countries' national soccer
teams. Sarkisian has made clear that he will not travel to Turkey
for their return match this fall unless Ankara takes "real steps"
to reopen the Turkish-Armenian border.

Novruz Mammadov, a top aide to Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev,
likewise claimed earlier this week that the Karabakh mediators have
stepped up pressure on the Armenian side not least because of the
Turkish-Armenian dialogue. The Armenian Foreign Ministry brushed
aside the claim.

Visiting Turkey on Thursday, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir
Putin reaffirmed his country's stated commitment to ending the
Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict. But he said Moscow can not force
either party to go along with the compromise deal. "We will by all
means assist in finding agreements and compromises that will lead to
a final and complete settlement of the conflict," Putin told a news
conference in Ankara.
SERIOUS PROGRESS ACHIEVED IN NAGORNO-KARABAKH CONFLICT
RESOLUTION, RUSSIAN PREMIER VLADIMIR PUTIN
BSANNA NEWS
Aug 7 2009
Ukraine

ANKARA, 7 August. (AzerTAc). There is a serious progress in peace
talks on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan,
visiting Ankara Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin told a joint
news conference following the meeting with his Turkish counterpart
Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

He said Russia`s president Dmitry Medvedev regularly meets Azerbaijani
and Armenian leaders to discuss settlement of the conflict.

Russian Prime Minister noted: "We want the Karabakh problem to be
solved. Russia does not want any conflict to exist in the Caucasus
region because the conflicts negatively impact on our relations with
regional countries. We cannot undertake any step on behalf of the
conflict sides, we can only help them reach agreement."
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