Azerbaijan will not allow the status quo to be maintained in Nagorno-Karabakh. On July 8, 2009 on the occasion of the 90th anniversary of Azerbaijani diplomacy, Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov stated “the Armenian party must be confident that Baku will not allow the current situation in Nagorno-Karabakh to remain unchanged in the future.”

“We are making every effort for the peaceful settlement of the conflict, and I have to say are moving forward, though slowly, but we must keep on moving step by step,” he said.

Once more Minister Mammadyarov expressed confidence that the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict must be settled on the principle of Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity, with the Armenian troops to be withdrawn from the “occupied territories”.

In 1994, after a three-year war, the Armenian and Azerbaijani parties established cease-fire.

Negotiations for settling the conflict are under way within the OSCE Minsk Group co-chaired by Russia, France and the USA.