Medvedev’s Farewell Meeting with Sargsyan, Aliyev Won’t Yield Any Results: Russian Analyst

The meeting of the presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan at the end of this month in Sochi will be the last such meeting held by Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, so no breakthroughs should be expected, said Russian analyst Alexander Sotnichenko in an interview with 1news.az.

“In the near future, unfortunately, breakthroughs in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict shouldn’t be expected. The meetings among political leaders will continue, but their outcome, all the same, will be reducing the degree of tension between the parties,” he said.

With regard to the activities of the OSCE Minsk Group, according to the analyst, he has repeatedly stated its lack of objectivity and the actual meaninglessness of its activities.

“Even the 1994 ceasefire was achieved first and foremost through Russia’s actions. However, the Minsk Group operates under the auspices of the OSCE, and there is no other structure. Parties wishing to resolve the conflict must initiate the emergence of a fundamentally different international structure, which will take into account the errors of the previous [structure] and propose a new approach to conflict resolution. In this regard, I am a supporter of withdrawing the problem from the OSCE’s jurisdiction and creating a new regional organization to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, the lead actors of which would be Russia and Turkey under the auspices of the UN. However, this requires the careful coordination of the positions of Moscow and Ankara and a mutual desire of cooperation in the region,” Sotnichenko concluded.