Karabakh pullout agreed, says Aliyev

Hurriyet Daily News with wires

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"The pullback from five Azerbaijani territories is reflected in the OSCE’s Minsk Group proposals, and only after the complete withdrawal can there be discussion of a status for Karabakh," President Ilham Aliyev said over the weekend. "It may take a year, maybe 10 years, maybe 100 years, or it will never be possible. Time will tell," Aliyev said.

Armenia and Azerbaijan started peace negotiations under Russian mediation and in November agreed to intensify peace talks aimed at ending a decades-long conflict. The Nagorno-Karabakh region unilaterally declared independence from Azerbaijan in 1988, sparking a six-year armed conflict that claimed 35,000 lives.

A 1994 cease-fire has been periodically interrupted by firefights. The United States, Russia and France co-chair an international panel, the Minsk Group, which has sought to mediate the dispute between the two countries.

Aliyev also signaled that Karabakh would effectively be cut off from Armenia, adding that these principles have been agreed upon without any discussion on the status of Nagorno-Karabakh.

"The point is that we understand the concerns of those living in Nagorno-Karabakh, that after the return of all seven occupied regions of Azerbaijan, Nagorno-Karabakh will again be cut off geographically from Armenia because Nagorno-Karabakh has never had links with Armenia," said Aliyev in an interview with Russian state television, Vesti.

"The proposals which we are discussing today and which we accept and agree on do not include the question of status. If this is brought up again as a precondition for coordination of positions we will not achieve anything," added Aliyev. "We certainly do not see any possibility of the existence of Nagorno-Karabakh as an independent state," U.S. based Armenian daily Asbarez quoted him as saying.

The Azerbaijani president also said that Karabakh should revert back to its Soviet status of being an "autonomous province." Under that status, he said, the governing structure of Karabakh was a body comprised of an Azerbaijani representative from Shusha, which he said was populated by 90 percent Azeris.

Under the peace agreement, a majority Azeri population should populate Shusha again, he said.

Shusha has been under the control of the self-proclaimed Nagorno-Karabakh region since its capture in 1992 during the Nagorno-Karabakh War. However, it is internationally recognized as being part of Azerbaijan, with the status of an administrative division serving as the administrative center of the surrounding Shusha Rayon.

"After Azeris return to Shusha and Nagorno-Karabakh we will naturally discuss the question of the status in the future," he said. "Of course, Nagorno-Karabakh should have some kind of status. We understand this. But, we do not see this status outside the sovereign Azerbaijani State. I think that the process of negotiations could be more constructive after the liberation of the occupied territories."

"The question is the phased withdrawal of Armenian forces from occupied territories outside Nagorno-Karabakh is the first stage. Immediately after the signing of agreements, troops are slated to be withdrawn from five regions," said Aliyev, adding that the withdrawal of forces from the two regions would take place five years after the initial pull back.