The presidents of the United States, France and Russia on Saturday issued a joint statement on Nagorno-Karabakh during the G8 summit in Canada, urging the parties to the conflict to accelerate work and move closer to a peace deal.
Barack Obama, Nicolas Sarkozy and Dimity Medvedev called on the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan to “take the next step and complete the work” on the main principles of settlement of the protracted conflict in order to begin drafting a peace agreement.
The three countries jointly head the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe’s Minsk Group that brokers a solution to the conflict.
Reaffirming their commitment “to support the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan as they finalize the Basic Principles for the peaceful settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict,” the U.S., French and Russian leaders said:
“We welcome as a significant step the recognition by both sides that a lasting settlement must be based upon the Helsinki Principles and the elements that we proposed in connection with our statement at the L’Aquila Summit of the Eight on July 10, 2009, relating to: the return of the occupied territories surrounding Nagorno-Karabakh, interim status for Nagorno-Karabakh guaranteeing security and self-governance, a corridor linking Armenia to Nagorno-Karabakh; final status of Nagorno-Karabakh to be determined in the future by a legally-binding expression of will, the right of all internally-displaced persons and refugees to return, and international security guarantees, including a peacekeeping operation.
“Now the Presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan need to take the next step and complete the work on the Basic Principles to enable the drafting of a peace agreement to begin. We instruct our Ministers and Co-Chairs to work intensively to assist the two sides to overcome their differences in preparation for a joint meeting in Almaty on the margins of OSCE Informal Ministerial.”
The conflict between Armenians and Azerbaijanis over Nagorno-Karabakh, a predominantly ethnic Armenian region, erupted in 1988 and escalated into a full-blown war in the early 1990s when the region declared its independence from Baku amid the disintegration of the Soviet Union.
More than 30,000 people are estimated to have died on both sides in the 1991-94 war that ended with a Russia-brokered ceasefire. Armenians remain in control of Nagorno-Karabakh, but tensions along the line of contact with Azerbaijan have persisted.
One of the deadliest ceasefire violations in years occurred in the conflict zone on June 18-19. Four Armenian and one Azeri troops were killed after Azerbaijani commandos attempted to overrun the Armenian positions in northeastern Karabakh. The attack happened within hours after a Russia-hosted Armenian-Azeri summit discussing the future of Karabakh. Yerevan was quick to accuse Baku of trying to torpedo the peace talks.
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