OSCE Minsk Group urged the parties to take advantage of the positive momentum around Nagorno-Karabakh

OSCE Minsk Group urged the parties of Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict to take advantage of the positive momentum created at the Sochi Summit, where Azerbaijani, Russian and Armenian presidents met, said in a statement of Minsk Group, published at OSCE web-site on Thursday.

"The Co-Chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group (Ambassadors Bernard Fassier of France, Robert Bradtke of the United States, and Igor Popov of the Russian Federation) urged the parties to focus on the priority issues in order to make progress in reaching an agreement on the Basic Principles for Resolving the Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict", - the Co-Chairs said in a statement.

The Co-Chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group traveled to Baku, Yerevan, and Nagorno-Karabakh March 15-17. In Baku, they met with President Ilham Aliyev and Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov, and in Yerevan they met with OSCE Chairman-in-Office, the Foreign Minister of Lithuania, Audronius Azubalis, the Co-Chairs said in a statement.

Co-Chairs urged the parties to take advantage of the positive momentum created at the Sochi Summit. They also discussed with the parties concrete measures to implement the commitment in the joint statement agreed at Sochi regarding the investigation of violations of the 1994 ceasefire, the Co-Chairs said in a statement.

They stressed that recent events along the Line of Contact, before and after the Sochi Summit, had demonstrated the urgent need for such a mechanism and called upon all the parties to respect the ceasefire, the Co-Chairs said in a statement.

The Co-Chairs referred to their longstanding proposal for the withdrawal of snipers, regretted that it has not been implemented, and again urged its adoption, which could save innocent lives, the Co-Chairs said in a statement.

The Co-Chairs presented their Field Assessment Report to the two Presidents and the de facto authorities in Nagorno-Karabakh. They noted that they would be briefing the Minsk Group in Vienna on the report on March 23 and would have no public comment on it until then.


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