OSCE report: Karabakh conflict dominated in 2016 agenda

By Azernews

By Rashid Shirinov

Despite a deadly spike in the confrontation over Azerbaijan’s Nagorno-Karabakh region and limited progress overall, the OSCE persists in striving towards peaceful and durable settlement to this conflict, says the OSCE Annual Report 2016.

The report noted that conflicts in the OSCE area continued to dominate the organization’s agenda in 2016, and the renewed escalation of violence in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict in spring 2016 required intensified crisis management.

On April 2, 2016, all the frontier positions of Azerbaijan were subjected to heavy fire of large-caliber weapons, mortars and grenade launchers by Armenian army. Azerbaijani counter-attack led to liberation of several strategic heights and settlements. The armed clashes resulted in deaths and injuries among the Azerbaijani population. The military operations were stopped on April 5 with mutual consent of the sides.

The OSCE report stated that the German chairmanship made considerable efforts in addressing the conflicts to strengthen OSCE formats for conflict resolution and improving the living conditions of people affected by conflicts.

“With regard to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, the chairmanship reacted swiftly after the escalation of hostilities at the line of contact in April 2016, initiating a special meeting of the Permanent Council and advocating the implementation of agreements reached at the presidential level in Vienna and St. Petersburg,” the report said. The agreements concerned the expansion of the office of the personal representative of the chairperson-in-office, Ambassador Andrzej Kasprzyk, and the establishment of an investigative mechanism.

The document also stated that the OSCE chairmanship called for the resumption of a political negotiation process to settle the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict began in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. As a result of the ensuing war, in 1992 Armenian armed forces occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts. More than 20,000 Azerbaijanis were killed and over 1 million were displaced as a result of the large-scale hostilities. The 1994 ceasefire agreement was followed by peace negotiations.