OSCE Secretary General said about the inadmissibility of the status quo in the Karabakh conflict

The OSCE will continue to cooperate with Azerbaijan in order to implement the country’s commitments to the international organization. This was at a press conference in Baku OSCE by the Secretary General Lamberto Zaner after the talks with Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov.

    Zaner pointed to three areas of OSCE Office in Baku. The first is the political and military direction and in the field of implementing projects in support of the Azerbaijani police.

   The second priority is the economy and the environment and, in particular, support for small and medium business and environmental programs.

   The third area is the work of the OSCE human dimension, strengthening civil society, monitoring of ships, free legal services.

    In turn, Mammadyarov said that Zaner put forward several proposals for the conduct of elections. In addition to these issues, the parties attached great importance to the Karabakh settlement.

    OSCE Secretary General expressed his concern over the frequent armed incidents on the contact line of troops, accompanied by the loss of human life.

He called such incidents unacceptable and intolerable. Urgent measures to prevent casualties. However, he emphasized the inadmissibility of the preservation of the status quo.

    In his view, refraining from the use of force should be the basic principle of the Karabakh settlement.

   Zaner called for strengthening the monitoring role of the OSCE, the withdrawal of snipers, taking steps to measures of mutual trust, investigating the incidents at the contact line. He stressed that on the one hand it is necessary to strengthen the cease-fire, on the other - the acceleration of the process of political settlement.

   In this case, the parties themselves must negotiate, the OSCE also creates a platform for negotiations. He noted that the alternative to a peaceful settlement of the conflict there.

        With regard to mechanisms for investigating incidents, the OSCE Secretary General said that this question is more to the OSCE's Minsk Group. In his opinion, it comes to publicizing and informing the public about the incident, unless the parties agree on the procedures for such investigations.

      Zaner also said the OSCE Minsk Group will arrive in the region in the near future.

       According to Mammadyarov, "the problem is not in the mechanisms, but in the occupation of Azerbaijani territories." If Armenia withdraws its troops from the occupied territories, the challenge questions and snipers will be automatically lifted, as well as incidents and investigation mechanisms. 

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