Baku, Azerbaijan, June 4 / Trend, R.Darakhshan /
Relations between Azerbaijan and the U.S. have a strategic nature, Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov said Friday.
"I believe that the relations between Azerbaijan and the United States are developing quite well. I'll just mention that the nature of it is a strategic one," Mammadyarov said before a meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Washington D.C, U.S. State Department's official website reported.
According to him, the two countries need to even more deepening and strengthening their cooperation.
Azerbaijani Foreign Minister thanked Clinton for trying to bring more peace and stability to the region and to resolve Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.
"There was a recent statement by the presidents [of U.S., Russia and France] which I believe also helpful from the point of view that this unresolved conflict is on the screen of the international community. And we all together have to work harder to make a breakthrough [in resolving the conflict] ,"- said the minister.
On May 26, the presidents of the Minsk Group co-chairing countries made a joint statement on Nagorno-Karabakh conflict at the G8 summit in Deauville, France.
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, U.S President Barack Obama and French President Nicolas Sarkozy called on the Armenian and Azerbaijani leaders to demonstrate the political will and to finalize the work over the basic principles of [the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict] during the upcoming Armenian-Azerbaijani summit in June.
The conflict between the two South Caucasus countries began in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. Armenian armed forces have occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan since 1992, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and 7 surrounding districts.
Azerbaijan and Armenia signed a ceasefire agreement in 1994. The co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group - Russia, France, and the U.S. - are currently holding the peace negotiations.
Armenia has not yet implemented the U.N. Security Council's four resolutions on the liberation of the Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding regions.