Azerbaijan, Baku/ Trend , corr. I. Alizadeh/ Ganira Pashayeva, Member of the Milli Majlis (Azerbaijan's Parliament), Member of the Azerbaijani Parliamentary Delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) has stated that Azerbaijan is still intent on passing the Bill "On Alternative Military Service".
In its resolve to join the Council of Europe, Azerbaijan made the commitment to pass the Bill - "On Alternative Military Service". However Baku considers this to be impossible until the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is resolved. This issue has also been included into reports by the PACE's Co-Rapporteurs for Azerbaijan.
The member of the Azerbaijani Parliamentary Delegation says that Azerbaijan was unable to fulfill two of the total number of commitments to the European Organization. The first commitment is the peaceful resolution of the Armenian-Azerbaijani Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and the second is the adoption of the Bill - "On Alternative Military Service". "It is actually necessary to put forward the issue to adopt the Bill "On Alternative Military Service" for public consideration and discussion, since Azerbaijan is a country, which is still in a state of war. We will not abandon this commitment, although it will take some time before the bill is passed," said Mrs. Pashayeva. The Azerbaijani MP considers that Azerbaijan has fulfilled most of its commitments to the Council of Europe.
The Spring Session of PACE will launch its work in its Headquarters in Strasburg in due course. During the session, the issue on Azerbaijan's fulfilling its commitments to PACE, our country has taken upon itself. The Azerbaijani Parliamentary Delegation to participate in the forthcoming event will include Samad Seyyidov (the head of the Azerbaijani Delegation), MPs Gultakin Hajjiyeva, Sabir Hadjiyev, Ganira Pashayeva, Ali Husseynov, and Rafael Husseynov. The PACE session is expected to conclude on April 20.