The Armenian-Azerbaijani-Russian presidential meeting in Sochi, March 5, did not register any progress in the Nagorno-Karabakh peace process, Vahan Hovhannisyan, Chairman of the ARF-D parliamentary faction, told Armenian News-NEWS.am.

As regards the trilateral presidential statement, particularly the point on investigation of possible incidents on the line of contact under the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs` auspices, Hovhannisyan said that it is a declarative point. "This point cannot be put into practice, a there are no mechanisms of implementing it," Hovhannisyan said. His earlier forecast was that no progress would be made at the trilateral presidential meeting. Any progress in the peace process is impossible without Nagorno-Karabakh`s participation in the negotiations. "Yerevan must flatly state that it can continue negotiations only with Stepanakert`s participation. Otherwise, all the Armenian-Azerbaijani top-level meetings are going to be `regular` ones," Hovhannisyan said.

Armenian News-NEWS.am reminds readers that, after considering the implementation of the Astrakhan statement of October 27, 2010, at their March 5 meeting in Sochi, the Presidents also agreed on additional steps.

The first step is completing the POW exchange process as soon as possible. However, no Azeri POWs are in the Armenian territory now, whereas Azerbaijan is still keeping Armenian POWs.

The second point envisages settling all the disputable issues in a peaceful way and investigating possible incidents on the line of contact with the parties` participation, under the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs` auspices and with the assistance of the Special Representative of the OSCE Chairman-in-Office. According to diplomatic sources, the Azeri leader reluctantly agreed to this point.