YEREVAN (Itar-Tass)–According to Levon Ter-Petrosyan’s spokesperson Levon Zourabyan–the United States did not propose sending its peacekeepers to the Nagorno-Karabakh region.
Zourabyan made this statement–dismissing US media reports alleging that Undersecretary of State Strobe Talbott made this proposal during his recent trip to the region with co-chairmen of the Minsk group on the Karabakh conflict.
Zourabyan also refuted a statement made by the Azeri side concerning initiatives of the Minsk group. "Azerbaijan is trying to present its wishes and desires as real facts," he said.
US State Department spokesperson Nicholas Burns also refuted claims of US troop deployment in the Caucasus.
Diplomatic sources in Azerbaijan said the co-chairmen proposed that the Nagorno-Karabakh region relinquish not only what’s called Azeri territory in the armed conflict but also the Shushi district–which is part of Nagorno-Karabakh.
The Azeri sources also claimed that the co-chairmen were going to include Karabakh’s armamen’s in Armenia’s quota laid down by the Conventional Forces in Europe treaty.
It is not clear how Azeri sources came up with such a notion.
