James Appathurai: NATO of no help in settling Caucasian conflicts

As stated today by James Appathurai, Special NATO Representative for the Caucasus and Middle Asia, the Alliance has no plans to take part in settling the Armenian-Azerbaijani (Nagorno-Karabakh) conflict.

"The NATO doesn't see its role in settling the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict, although the current relations between the two countries cause our concern," he said at a press conference in Moscow.

Mr Appathurai has also added that the Alliance does not intend to figure in any way in the South-Ossetian and Abkhazian issues, the RIA "Novosti" reports.

In his turn, Alexander Markarov, director of the Armenian Branch of the CIS Institute, believes that Armenia should raise the issue before some NATO member countries on restricting arms shipments to Azerbaijan.

"An issue should be raised before some NATO member countries, in particular, Turkey, Ukraine and, to some extent, Israel, who supply weapons to Azerbaijan, on the need to introduce embargo on arms supplies, in particular, of offensive weapons," the "News-Armenia" quotes Mr Markarov as saying.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that the co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group (MG) for settling the Karabakh problem said on February 11 that Azerbaijan and Armenia should take decisive actions towards settling the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

Let us remind you that in November 2010 Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan refused to go to the Lisbon NATO Summit because of the presence in the draft declaration of unacceptable, according to the Armenian party, phrases related to settlement of South-Caucasian conflicts.