make preferableYEREVAN.- U.S. Embassy in Armenia responded to the remarks on the Nagorno-Karabakh issue included in State Department’s 2011 Human Rights Report.
“The language describing Nagorno-Karabakh in the 2011 Human Rights Report for Armenia follows our guidelines for the reports of all countries,” Embassy said in a statement posted on its official Facebook account.
“It in no way prejudges the outcome of the Nagorno-Karabakh negotiations between Armenia and Azerbaijan under the auspices of the OSCE Minsk Group.
We continue to uphold the principles of the Helsinki Final Act – in particular those relating to the non-use of force or the threat of force, territorial integrity, and equal rights and self-determination of peoples – as fundamental elements of any resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.”
As reported earlier, the report contained the following sentence in both sections referring to Armenia and Azerbaijan: “Ethnic Armenian separatists, with Armenia’s support, continued to control most of the Nagorno-Karabakh region of the country and seven surrounding Azerbaijani territories.”
In response to the report, the Armenian National Committee of America said State Department undermined prospects for a negotiated settlement of the very status and security issues it is helping to mediate regarding Nagorno-Karabakh.
