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Hoagland: US should play more active role in Karabakh settlement process

10 May 2017 11:00 (UTC +04:00)

The US should play a more active role in the settlement process of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, US co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group Richard Hoagland said in an interview to the Voice of America, APA reported.

“We are currently at the initial state of the new US presidential administration. Washington is still considering different versions of building its foreign policy course,” said Hoagland. “We need to wait a little, and we will see what progress we can achieve in the future. The main thing in the peace-building process depends on senior officials of the conflicting parties.”

Hoagland noted that the co-chairs can not give a full guarantee of maintaining the ceasefire.

“This must be achieved directly by the leaders of the conflicting parties. They should take the initiative and say that it is time for a better life, a more beautiful world. We should focus on the proposals that will satisfy both sides. The leaders must sit at the negotiating table and hold talks that can benefit everyone. In such conflicts, one need try to achieve a common conclusion that will be useful to everyone, and all should strive for this,” he added.

The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict entered its modern phase when the Armenian SRR made territorial claims against the Azerbaijani SSR in 1988.

A fierce war broke out between Azerbaijan and Armenia over the Nagorno-Karabakh region of Azerbaijan. As a result of the war, Armenian armed forces occupied some 20 percent of Azerbaijani territory which includes Nagorno-Karabakh and seven adjacent districts (Lachin, Kalbajar, Aghdam, Fuzuli, Jabrayil, Gubadli and Zangilan), and over a million Azerbaijanis became refugees and internally displaced people.

The military operations finally came to an end when Azerbaijan and Armenia signed a ceasefire agreement in Bishkek in 1994.

Dealing with the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is the OSCE Minsk Group, which was created after the meeting of the CSCE (OSCE after the Budapest summit held in December 1994) Ministerial Council in Helsinki on 24 March 1992. The Group’s members include Azerbaijan, Armenia, Russia, the United States, France, Italy, Germany, Turkey, Belarus, Finland and Sweden.

Besides, the OSCE Minsk Group has a co-chairmanship institution, comprised of Russian, the US and French co-chairs, which began operating in 1996.

Resolutions 822, 853, 874 and 884 of the UN Security Council, which were passed in short intervals in 1993, and other resolutions adopted by the UN General Assembly, PACE, OSCE, OIC, and other organizations require Armenia to unconditionally withdraw its troops from Nagorno-Karabakh.