Steven Mann: "Nagorno-Karabakh conflict will be settled during one year or during one hundred years"

We hope sincerely that the agreement on the Nagorno-Karabakh settlement will be signed in 2006, the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairman from Russia Yuri Merzlyakov said in a statement on 17 December at the news conference in Baku, Trend reports.

"The co-chairs are only mediators and the major role in the negotiation process remains for Armenia and Azerbaijan," said Merzlyakov. According to him, it would be easier for the co-chairs to take act if the sides do not use militant statements and the cease-fire regime is not violated.

"There is a ground for enthusiasm for the co-chairs and we think, the specific base for signing the final agreement will reached in 2006," noted the Russian co-chair saying arrival of the OSCE 6 high level serviceman who have not been to Azerbaijan since 1998, also gives grounds for "certain optimistic conclusions".

As for the involvement of the representatives of the Nagorno-Karabakh Armenian community in the negotiation process Merzlykaov noted, "the move will be real only after coordinating the principles of the conflict settlement by the sides".

The US co-chair Steven Mann noted, neither of parties can "receive all they want", saying, the OSCE Minsk Group welcomes "advancement towards lessening of differences in the position of the sides". "It is possible that the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict will be settled during one year or during one hundred years," said Mann. He also noted that the US financial support to Nagorno-Karabakh is "minimal and bears the humanitarian character".

The OSCE Minsk group French co-chair Bernard Facie called statements of municipality heads of some cities in France on the partnership with the residential settlements of Nagorny Karabakh to be "nonsense". "There are 38,000 municipalities and none of them is entitled to make political statements. Such statements are mere rubbish," stated the French co-chairman in conclusion.

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