Elmar Mammadyarov: Azerbaijan is ready to star work on peace treaty on settlement of Nagorno Karabakh conflict

Azerbaijan calls Armenia to start work on peace treaty on settlement of Nagorno Karabakh conflict without prevarications, said Azerbaijani Foreign Minister in his interview to “Interfax”. “I think that the certain progress was achieved and we can calmly start the preparation of the peace treaty” – Elmar Mammadyarov underlined.

Answering the question “when is Baku ready to start negotiations on peace treaty with the Armenian side”, the minister’s response was concrete: “Right away”.

Commenting the Kazan meeting of the presidents Mammmadyarov said that “Many Mass Media reports claim that the meeting was unsuccessful, but I disagree. I agree more with the position that, firstly, as reflected in the statement of the presidents, the rapprochement occurred, and, secondly, we - Azerbaijan and Armenia – must continue negotiations without any PR, tantrums, to work on the rapprochement of positions. Moreover, Azerbaijan is still in the same position demonstrated in Sochi: we are ready to begin the work on peace treaty”.

According to Mammadyarov, Kazan meeting showed that several elements which should be in the peace treaty, have not been coordinated yet: “If in fact there is a good will, let’s work on negotiations without waiting for next stage of negotiations on basic principles”. The minister said that the main principles were existing as basis.

“We know that in what direction we are moving on the conflict’s settlement. There are uncoordinated details in the basic principles. Why it is needed to triple the efforts for coordination of these elements. Any way they will be reflected in the peace treat. Let’s start immediately the work on peace treaty and demonstrate our will to the entire world that we are ready to work on a legally binding peace agreement, rather than on a political document”.

The minister also expressed his view on the latest incident in Afghanistan, where Azerbaijani cargo plane was shot down by the Taliban soldiers.

“Azerbaijan is carrying out intensive work with Afghan side in order to go to the accident side of the “Il-76” plane around Kabul”, Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Mammadyarov told “Interfax”.

The minister said that there was no information about access to the bodies. We are carrying out intensive work with the Afghan side in order to go to the crash site. Our ambassador accredited to Afghanistan with his residence in Islamabad has been given appropriate instructions in this regard”.

Asked whether Taliban is the major obstacle to reach the site, the minister responded that “it is not only about presence of Taliban in this area, but the location is very difficult to reach”.

According to Mammadyarov, it is impossible to say anything about the crash’s reasons until a “black box” is found and studied. Despite all hardships, Azerbaijan will seek full investigation into reasons that caused the crash: “All questions must be definitely put an end”.


/APA/