FRANCE 24’s senior correspondent Catherine Norris-Trent is on the ground in Baku as talks to resolve the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh are set to begin in Geneva.
Azeri officials told Norris-Trent that Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov would meet with officials from the OSCE (Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe) Minsk Group, set up to mediate the conflict in 1992, to voice his nation’s opposition to the process.
The group is chaired by the US, Russia and France, but Azerbaijan contends that France is unable to be an honest broker, Trent-Norris reported. French President Emmanuel Macron has criticised Turkey’s role in the conflict, which Azeri officials interpret as support for Armenia.
Armenia and Azerbaijan have been locked in a dispute over Nagorno-Karabakh for decades. Nagorno-Karabakh lies inside Azerbaijan but has been under the control of ethnic Armenian forces backed by Armenia for more than a quarter of a century.
Heavy fighting broke out in the region on September 27 in the worst escalation of hostilities since 1994 when a truce ended a war that raged for several years.
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(FRANCE 24 with AP, AFP)
