STEPANAKERT, YEREVAN—The Co-Chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group Bernard Fassier (France), Robert Bradtke (US) and Igor Popov (Russia) as well as the Personal Representative of the OSCE Chairman-in-Office Andrjey Kasprzyk, met with Nagorno-Karabakh Republic President Bako Sahakian to discuss the conflict resolution process.
Following the meeting, Karabakh presidential spokesperson Davit Babayan told the press that the co-chairmen would not be holding a press conference, reserving that for after their visit to Baku, where they were headed after their stop in Stepanakert.
According to Yerkir, the co-chairmen will travel to Baku through Azerbaijan-Karabakh line of contact.
Kasprzyk is scheduled to lead a regular monitoring of the LoC on Wednesday.
The co-chairmen arrived in Karabakh from Yerevan where they met with President Serzh Sarkisian and Foreign Minister Eduard Nalbandian.
Nalbandian told the Co-chairmen that Azerbaijan was distorting a recently publicized Executive Summary of their field assessment mission regarding the liberated territories surrounding the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic to further aggravate the situation and continue to threaten military action.
Nalbandian also added that the Azerbaijani comments on the report contradicted the assessments presented by the Co-Chairs, thus not only casting a shadow on the Co-Chairs’ efforts, but also negatively impacting the negotiation process.
Nalbandian and the Co-Chairs discussed the possibility of creating a mechanism for the prevention and investigation of incidents in the line of contact in line with the statement made by the Presidents of Russia, Armenia and Azerbaijan in Sochi.
A. “… Discussed the possibility of creating a mechanism for the prevention and investigation of incidents in the line of contact in line with the statement made by the Presidents of Russia, Armenia and Azerbaijan in Sochi”.
Two thoughts:
1. Since Azerbaijan is the source of most of, if not all the incidents in the line of contact, Azerbaijan would benefit most from the prevention and investigation mechanism. It is a simple logic.
2. It seems that the hidden plan is turning on – “…keeping” forces are soon to be installed. Remember what was the next step? Azeris – are brought back and protected by the preventive and investigative mechanism. Artsakhians leave their land. From a minority Azeris become a majority.
I guess, in the near future we might hear is that there would be no airport inauguration until “creating a mechanism for the prevention and investigation of incidents in the line of contact”. Which might mean …
Armenia must be able to get out of this diplomatic trap. For better maneuvering, Armenian diplomacy has to diversify the content, means and resources. To show more dynamics – activate and freeze alliances.
B. Here we read ” … the liberated territories surrounding …”. But other source has posted ” … the territories surrounding …”. Let’s hope that Asbarez version is the one that happened.