Monday, February 1 2016 10:58

"Last week the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) discussed two Resolutions relating to the Nagorno Karabakh conflict, which became a peculiar cornerstone for that European institution. In fact, those Resolutions distorting the reality, impeding the peaceful negotiation process on the Karabakh conflict were an attempt by their authors to discredit that European high platform and deliberately mislead the international community," Armenian Parliament Speaker Galust Sahakyan said in his address to the parliamentarians, on February 1.

"They were also direct and indirect attempts to cast a shadow, to underestimate the OSCE Minsk Group activities and to make as a participant of the settlement of the Nagorno Karabakh issue an institution, which has no such function and authority," the speaker said.

He recalled that the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs urged PACE not to take such steps that would harm the OSCE Minsk Group mandate or complicate the continuing negotiation process.  "The actions preceding the debate of those resolutions and the results of the debates showed that the parliamentary diplomacy is a genuinely strong weapon, which never loses its significance, and which we can reasonably use. Moreover, it refers to both the members of our delegation and our colleagues not involved in it," Galust Sahakyan said.

"Regardless of the ballot results, both the abovementioned Resolution and, in general any other PACE resolution, we should not observe from the point of view of victory or defeat, especially when, they say, defeat is an orphan, and victory has a hundred fathers. The fact is that we are able to realize our force and use it unitedly for the benefit of the country. Though the false remains false, irrespective of its volume, nevertheless, the fact that as a result of everybody's efforts in one of the European most important platforms the so called report with the fake title and content "Escalation of Violence in Nagorno-Karabakh and the other occupied territories of Azerbaijan" failed, speaks that not everybody in the PACE saw the reality from Baku oil derrick," he said.  

On January 26, PACE approved the resolution entitled "Inhabitants of frontier regions of Azerbaijan are deliberately deprived of water" (rapporteur Milica Markovic, Bosnia and Herzegovina). 98 MPs voted for, 71 MPs voted against and 40 MPs abstained from voting. On the same day, PACE rejected the anti- Armenian resolution "Escalation of violence in Nagorno-Karabakh and the other occupied territories of Azerbaijan" (rapporteur Robert Walter, UK).