Paris Talks End in Failure
Shushi, Republic of Nagorno Karbakh © Onnik Krikorian / Oneworld Multimedia 2000
Talks between the Armenian and Azerbaijani presidents have broken down and hopes for the signing of a one page framework agreement have been dashed. The Associated Press, however, identifies the main stumbling blocks to what many hoped would be a breakthrough to end the 18 year old dispute over the mainly Armenian-inhabited territory of Nagorno Karabakh.
Going into the talks, the mediators had called the meetings the most important in years on the issue of Karabakh.
But after several hours of meetings Saturday, the U.S. mediator, Steven Mann, emerged exhausted and said: “There was no agreement.”
The sticking points were the future status of Nagorno-Karabakh and whether Armenian forces would withdraw from the border town of Kelbajar, said a source close to the discussions, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the talks.
After this, it will be interesting to see where the OSCE Minsk Group takes attempts to end the stalemate between the two neighboring countries. For sure, both leaders must surely be expected to address the long-standing issue of promoting dialogue and confidence building measures between their two peoples.
According to RFE/RL, the OSCE’s Minsk Group co-chairs will meet next month to discuss where next.
The American co-chair, Ambassador Steven Mann, told RFE/RL after the summit: “The full range of issues were discussed. There were, I think, good personal atmospherics between the two presidents and the discussions did not result in a substantial change of the positions that the parties have held for months.”
Mann said he and the other two Minsk Group co-chairs — Bernard Fassier of France and Yury Merzlyakov of Russia — will meet in Washington early next month to assess the outcome of the Rambouillet summit.
Unfortunately, I fear that the rhetoric of war will resurface again in Azerbaijan.
The rhetoric of war never stopped surfacing in Azerbaijan, to begin with.
Comment by Nessuna — February 12, 2006 @ 2:01 pm
Baku Today has some more information apparently from AFP saying that while the talks in Paris ended without agreement, the two Presidents will meet again to continue negotiations at “a later, unspecified date.”
http://www.bakutoday.net/view.php?d=16254
For background information on Nagorno Karabakh the BBC have a page at:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/country_profiles/3658938.stm
Comment by Onnik — February 12, 2006 @ 11:56 pm
Most Azeris back peace ahead of Karabakh talks in Paris
ITAR-TASS news agency, Moscow 9 Feb 06
Turan news agency, Baku 9 Feb 06
Azartac news agency, Baku 10 Feb 06
An opinion poll conducted ahead of the Paris-hosted meeting on Friday 10 February between the leaders of Azerbaijan and Armenia on the disputed region of Nagornyy Karabakh showed that half of the respondents want a peaceful solution to the conflict.
More than 47.8 per cent of the 628 people polled by the Azeri independent monitoring centre Ray said the conflict should be resolved peacefully, while 38.2 per cent preferred a military settlement, ITAR-TASS news agency reported on 9 February.
A total of 78.8 per cent said the dispute should be settled within the framework of Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity, and no-one backed the idea of Armenia’s annexation of Nagornyy Karabakh or of this breakaway region becoming an independent state, the agency said.
An absolute majority of the respondents, 81.2 per cent, believe that President Ilham Aliyev will never agree to cede Nagornyy Karabakh to Armenia, the report concluded.
The Azerbaijani Turan news agency reported on 9 February that the two presidents will hold separate meetings with French President Jacques Chirac on 10 February. It quoted the French embassy in Baku as saying that the two leaders will have after that a head-to-head meeting in Rambouillet. On 11 February, the OSCE mediators will join the talks, Turan said.
Prior to the meetings, President Aliyev received the president of France’s Total in Paris on 9 February, Azartac news agency reported.
The agency added that “the two men expressed their satisfaction with the level of energy cooperation and spoke about the company’s work in Azerbaijan”.
The sides also discussed future developments, Total’s involvement in the Sah Daniz gas project, and Azerbaijan’s participation in an international hydrocarbon transit project.
Comment by Onnik — February 13, 2006 @ 12:29 am
RFE/RL has more on the quite significant obstacles that resulted in the failure of the Paris talks.
http://www.armenialiberty.org/armeniareport/report/en/2006/02/465B6FA1-CCAF-49CC-9C51-6AF7199AE421.ASP
Hetq also has more on the failure of the talks at: http://www.hetq.am/eng/politics/0602-koch-aliev.html
Comment by Onnik — February 13, 2006 @ 9:40 pm