Negotiations must be continued on a Karabakh settlement, a top Baku official has said following a meeting of the Russian and Azerbaijani presidents.
Novruz Mammadov, head of the foreign relations department at the Azerbaijani Presidential Administration, was commenting on Dmitriy Medvedev and Ilham Aliyev's meeting in Sochi on 9 August.
"The presidents’ position can be described as follows: at recent meetings and talks mediated by President Dmitriy Medvedev, it became possible to bring closer the parties' positions on some issues in accordance with the Madrid principles,” 1news.az reported Mammadov as saying.
His words echoed comments by Ilham Aliyev at the start of the talks in Sochi. Thanking the Russian president for his mediation efforts, Aliyev said: "The rounds of talks have brought the positions of the sides closer."
The mediators have for some years been urging Azerbaijan and Armenia to agree on the Madrid principles, also known as the basic principles, for a settlement to the Karabakh conflict.
They include the withdrawal of Armenian forces from Karabakh and the surrounding districts, the return home of displaced persons and the determination of Karabakh's legal status through a referendum.
"It is therefore necessary to continue the negotiations," Azerbaijani Presidential Administration official Novruz Mammadov said on Wednesday.
"At the same time, President Ilham Aliyev described the numerous attempts by the Armenian leadership to use close circles and the Armenian diaspora to put the blame on Azerbaijan for the lack of success in negotiations, as happened after the meeting in Kazan, as a sign of their insincerity," Mammadov said.
President Aliyev once again briefed his Russian counterpart on Azerbaijan's position on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, the official said.
The Russian and Azerbaijani presidents spoke to the press before their meeting in Sochi on 9 August but made no statements afterwards.
The Russian president is expected to hold similar discussions with Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan, whom he is due to meet at a Collective Security Treat summit in Kazakhstan on 12 August.
| < Prev | Next > |
|---|
