Azerbaijan, Baku / corr Trend K.Ramazanova / The Tehran summit is not expected to adopt a Convention on the Caspian legal status, Khezer Ibrahim, the spokesman for the Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry, said on 16 October.
"Prior to adopting a convention the heads of state should approve a political document. Afterwards it will be possible to speak about the adoption of a convention on the Caspian status," he said
The summit of five Caspian littoral countries, including Iran, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Russia and Turkmenistan, began in Tehran on 16 October. The gathering will focus on the legal status of the Caspian, which remains unsettled after the collapse of the former USSR.
The first summit of the Caspian littoral countries was held in Ashgabat in April 2002. The gathering adopted a decision to conduct the second summit in Tehran in 2003. However, the event has been repeatedly postponed every year.
Azerbaijan, Russia and Kazakhstan do not lay any claims on each other on the issue of division of the Caspian sea ground. These three countries have signed bilateral and trilateral agreements in respect to this. The sides came to a common ground on the definition of the coordinates of the medium delineation line.
However, Turkmenistan and Iran abstained on the issue on the definition of coordinates of the medium line. Despite discussions for many years, this is a major obstacle in the determination of the Caspian status.