The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict can only be resolved by the parties to the conflict, said Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.  

 

Russia can not have concrete plans for resolving this issue, Lavrov said at a press conference on Friday, summarizing the results of Moscow’s diplomatic activities in 2017, an APA correspondent reported from Moscow.

 

He noted that Russia, together with the U.S. and France, is doing everything possible to resolve this conflict.

 

“We have made intensive efforts in recent years in order to summarize all the positions of the parties, identify overlapping approaches, bring them to a common denominator, as well as to offer compromise options on issues they cannot reach common ground.  This work was carried out intensively and consistently last year. The OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs have a common position on this issue, and the parties are aware of that. However, the decision has to be made by the parties,” added Russia’s top diplomat.

 

The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict entered its modern phase when the Armenian SRR made territorial claims against the Azerbaijani SSR in 1988.

 

A fierce war broke out between Azerbaijan and Armenia over the Nagorno-Karabakh region of Azerbaijan. As a result of the war, Armenian armed forces occupied some 20 percent of Azerbaijani territory which includes Nagorno-Karabakh and seven adjacent districts (Lachin, Kalbajar, Aghdam, Fuzuli, Jabrayil, Gubadli and Zangilan), and over a million Azerbaijanis became refugees and internally displaced people.

 

The military operations finally came to an end when Azerbaijan and Armenia signed a ceasefire agreement in Bishkek in 1994.

 

Dealing with the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is the OSCEMinsk Group, which was created after the meeting of the CSCE (OSCE after the Budapest summit held in December 1994) Ministerial Council in Helsinki on 24 March 1992. The Group’s members include Azerbaijan, Armenia, Russia, the United States, France, Italy, Germany, Turkey, Belarus, Finland and Sweden.

 

Besides, the OSCE Minsk Group has a co-chairmanship institution, comprised of Russian, the US and French co-chairs, which began operating in 1996.

 

Resolutions 822, 853, 874 and 884 of the UN Security Council, which were passed in short intervals in 1993, and other resolutions adopted by the UN General Assembly, PACE, OSCE, OIC, and other organizations require Armenia to unconditionally withdraw its troops from Nagorno-Karabakh.