Epress.am News from Armenia
Asked why there are no “visible results” in the OSCE Minsk Group process, which has been working to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict for over a decade, Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergey Lavrov, in a recent interview with Azerbaijani news agency Trend News, said though there might not be any visible results, there are in fact results which are invisible to the public.
“Many disputable issues have reduced substantially in number over the years Russia has been involved in the OSCE Minsk Group’s activities together with our American and French counterparts, and for the years when Russia has also been independently trying to help bring the positions of the conflicting parties closer, in line with the group’s position. And the work over the so-called basic principles, which is still underway, yielded some results in terms of finding a formula that at this stage can afford to fix the parties’ consent,” said Lavrov, reports Trend News.
“…there is an understanding that we have almost reached a compromise formula on a significant part of the text. We had a very simple proposal — to fix two or three questions, which are not yet subject to the agreed formula, for further discussions. Let me be clear, there will be no final agreement without these two issues.
“At this stage, it would allow fixing the progress that has been made over the significant part of the text and at the same time, to show that there are still some questions left, there are two to three concrete issues, which require further efforts, to consolidate what has been achieved so far,” he continued.
Lavrov stressed that approving the basic principles would give an important signal to the international community, that the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan aim to resolve the conflict and they aim to do so by peaceful settlement.
The Russian foreign minister also made a point of stating that the co-chairs alone cannot solve the conflict — agreement can only be reached by the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan.