Steinmeier: We have to avoid repetition of April events

Frank-Walter Steinmeier said this at the joint press conference with Armenian FM Edward Nalbandian today in Yerevan, while answering the question from Mediamax.

According to OSCE Chairperson-in-Office, the NK issue is the primary and main subject in the agenda of his visit to South Caucasus.

“Almost two months passed since military actions broke out in this region. I believe all parties of the conflict and the OSCE realized that the continuous status quo will be impossible to maintain. We need to avoid repetition of the April events and try to direct our efforts on finding a long-term solution of this conflict,” said Frank-Walter Steinmeier.

According to him, it is principally the right time to direct all efforts on making the negotiations on peaceful resolution more substantive.

“What took place earlier this year cannot happen again. We should find new terms to continue negotiations, strengthen the ceasefire regime and expand the staff of Ambassador Kasprzyk,” said Steinmeier.

He expressed his hope that substantive negotiations between Armenia and Azerbaijan will start in the course of this year.

“It is evident that we reached a good point after the meetings in Vienna and St. Petersburg, and both Armenian and Azerbaijani parties have expectations. Resolute measures are needed,” said OSCE Chairperson-in-Office.

Foreign Minister of Armenia Edward Nalbandian said in his turn that Germany supported the OSCE Minsk Group’s suggestion to establish incident investigation and confidence-building mechanisms in the conflict zone from the first day of its OSCE Chairmanship.

He reminded that Armenia often stated its agreement with the abovementioned suggestion. Armenian FM observed that the issue of creation of incident investigation mechanism was presented for the approval of the OSCE Advisory Committee on Management and Finance for three times in June. Nalbandian said that all but one OSCE participating states were in favour of approval, the exception being Azerbaijan.

Edward Nalbandian added that if the trilateral agreements on ceasefire of 1994 are respected and appropriate conditions are created for implementations of the agreements reached in Vienna and St. Petersburg, it will be possible to continue negotiations.