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Lavrov: Karabakh settlement depends on parties' political will

03 April 2017 09:22 (UTC +04:00)

Russia remains an active participant in the Nagorno-Karabakh settlement efforts, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in an article published on Monday by the Novoye Vremya newspaper in Yerevan, APA reported citing TASS.

In the article dedicated to the 25th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Russia and Armenia, Lavrov noted that settlement in Nagorno-Karabakh depends on Armenia’s and Azerbaijan’s political will and their readiness for compromise solutions.

"Much has been agreed but a number of issues, although the most complicated ones, are yet unsettled," he said. "But, obviously, results of the work depend, first of all, on the political will of the parties and their readiness to demonstrate flexibility and meet each other half-way."

"Jointly with the United States and France - the other co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group - we are helping the parties to reach sustainable solution to the conflict," the Russian top diplomat noted. "It was a key task of last summer’s trilateral summit in St. Petersburg that was initiated by the Russian president."

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.