Baku. Victoria Dementyeva – APA. “This is not an official position of Lithuania. Their official position coincides with Azerbaijan’s position. Simply such cases are used to undermine bilateral relations. Time will show whether this fact will affect the bilateral relations or not,” Ambassador of Azerbaijan to Lithuania Hasan Mammadzadeh told APA.
Asked whether the Lithuanian diplomats’ words on the Nagorno Karabakh conflict in phone conversations uploaded to Youtube will have an impact on the bilateral relations the ambassador said that in this regard he met with the Lithuanian officials, including Deputy Foreign Minister and senior advisor on foreign policy of the Presidential Administration: “As the Lithuanian Foreign Minister was on vacation, on our initiative, a meeting was held with the Deputy Minister. It also shows their concern over this situation. At the meeting, I was assured that the phone conversations don’t absolutely show the official position of Lithuania. As it is described in the documents signed by the presidents of the two countries, the official position of this country calls on the peaceful settlement of the conflict within the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan. I was assured that Lithuania is committed to this position.
Mammadzadeh said that the investigation is being conducted on the accuracy of the recordings: “We can not say confidently that the diplomats said those words or this is cutting aiming at provocation. I was told that objective investigation is being conducted and all necessary steps would be taken.”
Mammadzadeh noted that Lithuanian Ambassador to Azerbaijan Arturas Jurauskas had sent a letter of resignation to the Lithuanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs without waiting for the completion of the investigation.
Recordings of phone conversation among Lithuanian Ambassador to Azerbaijan Arturas Jurauskas, Lithuania’s Ambassador to Hungary Renatas Juška, deputy director of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Eastern Neighbourhood Policy Department Zenonas Kumetaitis and employee of the Foreign Ministry Gediminas Kasputis were uploaded to youtube.com on 8 July, 2013. The recordings were given with English subtitles. The men in the recording are having an informal conversation about Azerbaijan-Armenia relations, pro-Armenian opinions on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict between the two countries. “I consider it right to call Nagorno-Karabakh as Artsakh. I am supportive of those who lead Armenians,” the man, named as Juska said.
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