ArmInfo.The well-known statement by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Karabakh caused much ado about nothing in Armenia and Azerbaijan. Azerbaijani analyst Rauf Mirkadyrov expressed a similar opinion to ArmInfo.
"By and large, there was nothing new in Lavrov's statements except one point. For the first time in many years, he recalled the well-known four UN Security Council resolutions requiring the liberation of the occupied territories, the opening of all communications, ensuring the safety of civilians, and the return of refugees to places of permanent residence, establishing economic and diplomatic relations. However, he immediately made a reservation that the only acceptable format for the implementation of the resolutions is the institution of co-chairmanship of the OSCE Minsk Group, " he stressed.
According to Mirkadyrov's estimates, by and large, the Madrid principles are not an option for a phased settlement of the conflict, as the above-mentioned UN Security Council resolutions and the mandate of the Minsk Group require. In his opinion, in essence, the Madrid principles imply a package-phased settlement, when all issues are agreed in a package, but are implemented in stages.
Meanwhile, in the opinion of the Azerbaijani analyst, this contradicts UN Security Council resolutions requiring at the first stage eliminating the consequences of the armed phase of the conflict without any connection with the determination of the final status of Nagorno-Karabakh. The parties should have discussed the latter in subsequent stages, more specifically at the Minsk Conference.
According to the analyst, Lavrov's mention of the well-known resolutions with a stretch of imagination can be described as pressure not even on Armenia, but personally on Prime Minister Pashinyan, whom, according to Mirkadyrov, Moscow does not like. <On the whole, the reaction turned out to be inadequate, both in Baku and in Yerevan. At the same time, both in Baku and in Yerevan, they tried to use Lavrov's statement and subsequent events to solve domestic political problems,> he noted.
According to the analyst, the Armenian opposition behaved consistently, but completely unreasonably, once again accusing Pashinyan and his team of failure to negotiate. It is unfounded for the simple reason that the Madrid principles were developed back in 2007 when Robert Kocharian was president. And all subsequent years, Yerevan negotiated on the basis of these principles.
According to Mirkadyrov, the Azerbaijani opposition turned out to be even more consistent, which did not react at all to the storm raised by Lavrov in tea cup. However, some representatives of the ruling elite reacted, until recently, supervised by the clan of ex-head of the presidential administration Ramiz Mehdiyev. According to them, the Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov did not react harshly to the reaction of his Armenian counterpart to Lavrov's statements. "Some even accused Mammadyarov of sabotaging the offensive policy of Ilham Aliyev in the Karabakh direction and playing up to Armenia on the principle" the king is good, the retinue is bad>. All this is a showdown within the ruling elite, nothing more. In a word, nothing new is happening. All is quiet in Baghdad. Naturally, if we are talking about the process of resolving the Karabakh conflict, "Mirkadyrov summed up.
Since 1992, the OSCE Minsk Group, represented by the co-chairs from Russia, the USA and France, has been engaged in the settlement of the Karabakh conflict. Currently, the settlement process is nominally based on the Madrid Principles put forward by the OSCE Minsk Group in 2007 in Madrid and the Madrid Principles updated in 2009, which contain a phased and package settlement plan and deployment of a peacekeeping contingent in the conflict zone.