Azerbaijan has sent a note of protest to the French Foreign Ministry over the visit of four French deputies to separatist Nagorno-Karabakh.
The note, sent by Azerbaijan’s embassy in Paris, demands an explanation of the visit, Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry spokesman Elman Abdullayev said on Tuesday.
“The deputies, who paid an illegal visit to the occupied lands of Azerbaijan and thus showed disrespect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Azerbaijan, will be declared personae non gratae,” 1news.az reported Abdullayev as saying.
The French Foreign Ministry responded that the Karabakh visit was not an official one made through the French National Assembly, but a private initiative by Guy Teissier, chairman of the parliamentary commission for defence and the armed forces, Trend news agency reported.
Teissier is mayor of two districts in Marseilles which have a substantial ethnic Armenian population.
Azerbaijan's ambassador to France, Elchin Amirbayov, said that Teissier was trying to gain support ahead of the June 2012 National Assembly elections.
"It's not worth expecting any other explanation; it has been, remains and probably will remain common practice to make such visits. The French leadership can only express its dissatisfaction with the visits," Amirbayov said.
"The French Foreign Ministry tried to persuade Teissier not to make the trip. However, he decided to go, as the outcome of the elections hangs on the visit," the ambassador continued, quoting the French Foreign Ministry.
"Teissier's action does not signify solidarity with separatist Nagorno-Karabakh, which he mentioned, but the importance of the votes of the Armenians who live in his constituency."
The envoy said that officials at the French Foreign Ministry had reacted with understanding to Azerbaijan's concern.
"We said in our note that this step does not improve bilateral relations with Paris and harms the efforts of France, as a country co-chairing the OSCE Minsk Group on settlement of the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh.
"We expect the French Foreign Ministry to react on an official level to the note and an official representative of the French Foreign Ministry to set out at a briefing Paris' official position, as happened before," the ambassador concluded.
Regnum news agency reported earlier that a delegation of deputies from the French National Assembly, led by Guy Teissier, had visited the occupied lands of Azerbaijan. The delegation included Valerie Boyer, Georges Colombier and Jacques Remiller.
Guy Teissier said during a meeting with representatives of the de facto authorities in Nagorno-Karabakh that they were visiting the territory to show their solidarity, according to Regnum.
Visits to the Azerbaijani territory of Nagorno-Karabakh are technically illegal without permission from Baku. In practice, many people visit the breakaway territory.
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