It is very difficult to settle such conflicts- Bernard Fassier
19 Dekabr 2011 18:00 (UTC+04:00)
The term of tenure of the OSCE
Minsk Group co-chair Bernard Fassier expired. Fassier
held a press conference in Baku and said that it was his last visit to
Azerbaijan as the co-chair: "If I visit your country again I will come
as tourist or friend of Azerbaijan".
Fassier has visited today the Alley of Honor and the Alley of Martyrs,
met with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, Foreign Minister Elmar
Mammadyarov and Sheikh-ul-Islam Haji Allahshukur Pashazadeh.
"Don’t criticize the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs. We worked intensively
with the sides to organize the meetings of the presidents and foreign
ministers and to discuss all issues. We presented the basic principles
in the end of 2007 and then we presented the renewed version of these
principles. Many discussions have been held on these principles since
then. Unfortunately, the Kazan meeting didn’t justify hopes. The
mediation is a difficult mission, because the mediators are criticized
by both sides at the same time. It is very difficult to settle such
conflicts and to obtain consent from all persons participating in the
negotiation process for all aspects. But in any case we mustn’t lose a
hope. We still hope to achieve progress. For example, none of members of
the international community could visit the occupied areas around
Nagorno Karabakh till the start of my office, but now it is possible and
two such missions were realized up to now".