Baku, Azerbaijan, June 20
Trend:
The planned meeting of Azerbaijani and Armenian presidents in St. Petersburg is positive, says Malena Mard, head of the EU Delegation to Azerbaijan.
“I think this is of course positive in the way that they [the parties of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict] need a dialogue and a progress towards comprehensive settlement [of the conflict], because the status-quo is not acceptable,” she told reporters in Baku June 20.
The European Union hopes for peaceful, comprehensive settlement of the conflict and it supports the efforts towards that, including those of OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs, added Mard.
The conflict between the two South Caucasus countries began in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. As a result of the ensuing war, in 1992 Armenian armed forces occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts.
The 1994 ceasefire agreement was followed by peace negotiations. Armenia has not yet implemented four UN Security Council resolutions on withdrawal of its armed forces from the Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding districts.