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The negotiations during 2001

  


On January 26, 2001 a meeting held in Paris between Presidents of Azerbaijan and Armenia Heydar Aliyev and Robert Kocharian with mediation of Jacques Chirac. The parties agreed to continue the discussions. It was announced that the next negotiations would take place in March.
On February 22, 2001 the Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry had for the first time brought for discussion of the public in the press three settlement principles in the process of negotiations due to rumors on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. These principles were offered by the OSCE Minsk Group in 1997 and 1998 (the "package solution", "step by step solution" and "common state" plan) and so it became clear that Armenia has refused two of them.
On 4-7 April 2001 the long round of negotiations on the Karabakh conflict took place in the Key West (U.S.) between Presidents of Azerbaijan and Armenia Heydar Aliyev and Robert Kocharian. However, the four-day talks ended with no results. The mediators declared that the next negotiations would take place in Geneva (Switzerland) in June. On April 9, 2001 after the completion of negotiations in Key West (Florida) Azerbaijani and Armenian presidents arriving in Washington met separately with the U.S. President George Bush. US President declared that the mediation to achieve peace at the Karabakh conflict will be continued.

On May 18 the Minsk Group co-chairs visit in Baku in 2001, Kerri Kavano (USA), Nikolay Gribkov (Russia), and Philippe de Suremen (France) held talks with Azerbaijani President Heydar Aliyev. After the meeting the mediators talking to press had noted the intense discussions. The co-chairs informed that the expected meeting of Azerbaijani and Armenian presidents expected in Geneva would not take place. Only one year later (in June 2002) the matter was partially clarified that although the Armenian side initially expressed its consent with matters of "corridor sharing" agreed in Paris (March 2001) and the Key West (April 2001) for the settlement of Karabakh (which mean "Lachin corridor" between Nagorno-Karabakh and between Armenia and “Mehri corridor” between Nakhchivan and remaining part of Azerbaijan) but later they set back.
On June 1, 2001 within the framework of the summit of the CIS heads of state in Minsk (Belarus) a trilateral meeting between the Azerbaijani, Armenian and Russian presidents was held. At the meeting Heydar Aliyev, President of Azerbaijan noted that Baku still does not speak at the military language, but it would not last long. He informed that majority of the population does not believe in peace negotiations and support the liberation of the occupied territories by means of war. 



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