Azerbaijani president: UNSC resolutions on Nagorno-Karabakh remain on paper

Azerbaijani president: UNSC resolutions on Nagorno-Karabakh remain on paper
# 31 October 2017 12:57 (UTC +04:00)

Nagorno-Karabakh, an historical land of Azerbaijan, and seven surrounding districts are under Armenian occupation, Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev said on Tuesday.

The president made the remarks at a press conference following the 6th meeting of the Azerbaijan-Turkey High-Level Strategic Cooperation Council in Baku, APA reported.

“We also discussed the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict with the Turkish president. I informed President Erdogan about the negotiation process on the settlement of the conflict,” he said.

“Unfortunately, this conflict remains unresolved. Nagorno-Karabakh, an historical land of Azerbaijan, and seven surrounding districts are under Armenian occupation. One million Azerbaijanis became internally displaced as a result of the conflict,” noted President Aliyev.

The head of state recalled that the UN Security Council passed four resolutions on the conflict, which demand an immediate and unconditional withdrawal of Armenian armed forces from occupied Azerbaijani lands.

“However, these resolutions remain on paper. Armenia still ignores them, and the conflict remains unresolved,” stressed President Aliyev explaining this as a policy of double standards against Azerbaijan.

“In some cases, UNSC resolutions are implemented in several days, but when it comes to us, they have been remaining unfulfilled for more than 20 years,” he said.

The president noted that the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict will be resolved on the basis of international law and within the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan.

“There is no other way. Azerbaijan will never allow the creation of a second Armenian state on its historical lands,” said President Aliyev adding. “I expressed my gratitude to the Turkish president for supporting us in this matter. Turkey always supports Azerbaijan’s just cause in all international organizations.”

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.

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