ArmInfo."Today, Armenia represents itself to the world with a distinctive policy - constructive, balanced, principled, and trustworthy diplomacy. Those familiar with our diplomatic style know that Armenia is guided not by the "against" but by the "for" principle," Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan said in his address at the reception at the Armenian Ministry of Foreign Affairs held on the occasion of New Year and Holy Christmas.
"Armenia's approaches and viewpoints are understandable and conceivable for the international community thanks to our consistent and principled foreign policy, thanks to your - those present here - clear-cut foreign policies. The results of the summits in Vienna in Saint Petersburg after the Azerbaijani aggression in April prove it. The Hamburg Declaration of the Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the countries - Co-Chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group made in the end of this year, has shown how far from the reality the fabrications of the Azerbaijani side are with regard to the Nagorno Karabakh problem. At the same time, the Declaration has shown clearly how coherent are our approaches with those of the international community. There is no doubt that it became possible thanks to the consistent efforts of the Armenian diplomacy," the press office of the Armenian President quotes Serzh Sargsyan as saying.
"At this moment, it would be appropriate to note that experts, politicians or those, who believe they are, from time to time throw into the air the so called "options" for the resolution of the NK issue. However, in the reality they are not options but hypotheses. I state very clearly that until now nobody has been able to present precisely the option which we have been discussing painstakingly for years, and it is pretty understandable and conceivable, but when they are trying to get into the details, they slip up and start to speak of wishes. Diplomacy is not about wishes. Negotiations are not for making wishes true. I am not an expert diplomat but negotiations, I assume, is about the ability to reach compromise. And now, in your presence I would like to stress once again that since 2007 nothing other than the Madrid Principles has been negotiated anywhere. Why don't we, being aware of all details, because we are the negotiators, tell our public all the details? There are at least two reasons for that. You, as experienced negotiators, know very well that getting ready for negotiations, you will not open up your "toolbox", your hunches, your tactics or strategy because in the contemporary world it works like this: you say a word or two in Yerevan and they get to Baku, Washington, Moscow and Paris with the speed of a lighting and become public knowledge. This is one. And second, you all know that during crucial negotiations there works the following principle: nothing is agreed unless everything is agreed. If each time we return from the negotiations we tell our people "this sentence, this idea has been formulated this or that way," two weeks later, when something gets changed, we would have to start explaining again why it happened and so on. However, it is not essential, the essential thing is that starting from year 2007, meaning from the moment when the Madrid Principles were adopted as the base for the negotiations, we have been working towards one goal - the final status of Nagorno Karabakh will be decided by the people of Nagorno Karabakh. We will not dither on this principle," the President stressed.
Sargsyan added that Armenian diplomacy has presented to the international community Azerbaijan's aggression against Artsakh in April, the gravest violations of the international obligations and humanitarian law. "The Armenian diplomatic corps together with the countries of the OSCE Minsk Group continues to work on the establishment of peace. Armenia is a proponent of peace. We know very well how precious the peace is. It is no coincidence that today the pivots of our foreign policy are peaceful resolution of conflicts, non-use of force, and the prevention of crimes against humanity," he noted.