Strasbourg, 24.08.2001 - The 43-nation Council of Europe today called on the Nagorno-Karabakh de facto authorities to refrain from staging the one-sided "local self-government elections" in the province, planned for 5 September.
"These so-called 'elections' cannot be legitimate," stressed Council of Europe Committee of Ministers' Chairman and Liechtenstein Foreign Minister Ernst Walch, Parliamentary Assembly President Lord Russell-Johnston and Secretary General Walter Schwimmer. They recalled that following the 1991-1994 armed conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan, a substantial part of the region's population was forced to flee their homes and are still living as displaced persons in those countries or as refugees abroad.
"It is not in the interest of the Nagorno-Karabakh

side to be seen as undermining efforts to achieve an early and comprehensive settlement of the conflict by peaceful political means, as foreseen by the commitments that Armenia and Azerbaijan took upon their accession to the Council of Europe on 25 January 2001", said the Organisation's leaders. 
They reaffirmed that the Council of Europe fully supports the negotiating process being carried out under the OSCE auspices by the "Minsk Conference".
In this framework and in the field of its competencies, the Council of Europe is ready to contribute to the peace process, for instance through the good
offices of its Commission for Democracy through Law (Venice Commission), they said.
Press Release Council of Europe Press Service
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