Armenian MFA: apparently, for Baku constructiveness is saber-rattling

PanARMENIAN.Net - . Commenting on the statement made by head of the department for foreign affairs of the Azerbaijani President’s administration Novruz Mamedov with respect to the trilateral presidential meeting in Sochi, Armenian Deputy Foreign Minister Shavarsh Kocharyan said that Armenia does not need to change its stance in the Karabakh conflict settlement.

“Armenian Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian told the OSCE Permanent Council in Vienna that Armenia supports the updated Madrid principles proposed to the sides by the Minsk Group Co-Chairs in June, October and December 2010. Two weeks prior to it, the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairmen urged the parties at the OSCE Permanent Council to clearly express their support to the suggestions without reservations and amendments. Since Armenia has already given its ok to the principles, it is evident that the Co-Chairmen were waiting for Azerbaijan to change its stance and express clear support to them,” said Kocharyan.

According to him, if Azerbaijan agreed to the Madrid principles without a range of new reservations, it would have been an evident step forward in the negotiations. “It is high time that Baku change its so-called “constructive” stance by really constructive moves. If, according to the Azerbaijani version, warlike gestures, provocations on the contact line are “extremely fair efforts to settle the conflict peacefully,” it becomes clear why the Azerbaijani leadership stated after the Meindorf Declaration that a peaceful settlement is not an obligation of non-use of force, while after the Sochi statement, which clearly says that the parties should try to solve all disputable matters peacefully, according to the Azerbaijani interpretation, it is not a guarantee of peace,” the Armenian Deputy Foreign Minister said.

Head of the department for foreign affairs of the Azerbaijani president's administration Novruz Mamedov said that in Sochi “the Armenian side displayed some positive changes in its stance on Karabakh.”