YEREVAN, MAY 18, ARMENPRESS. On May 18, the delegation led by the President of the National Assembly of Armenia Alen Simonyan took part in the Council Meeting of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO PA) in Minsk, ARMENPRESS was informed from the parliament of Armenia.

Before the session, the President of the Republic of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko met with the heads of the delegations of the Member States. The President of Belarus spoke about the necessity of the formation of the new system of the international relations which will be based on the universally recognized norms and principles of the international law. “Minsk intends to work in raising cohesion of the CSTO States. The strengthening of the organization, the ensuring of security in its zone of responsibility is possibly existing after the solutions of contradictions,” he said.

After the meeting the heads of parliaments laid a wreath and flowers at the Victory Square in memory of those fallen in the Great Patriotic War.

The speech by the President of the National Assembly of Armenia Alen Simonyan at the Council Meeting of the CSTO PA is fully presented:

“Dear Vyacheslav Volodin,

Dear Vladimir Andreychenko,

Participants of the Collegial Meeting,

I welcome everybody at the Council Meeting of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO PA).

I thank you, Vladimir Pavlovich and our Belarus colleagues for warm reception and the organization of the Assembly events.

I also welcome the new Secretary General of the organization Tasmagambetov and wish him effective work in his responsible post.

Colleagues,

I would like to mention with satisfaction that the works continue by the Parliamentary Assembly on legally supporting the activity of the Collective Security Treaty Organization, elaboration of the proposals regarding the coordination of the legislative activity of national parliaments aimed at the implementation of the goals and problems of the organization. There is no need to enumerate all elaborated proposals, the model laws and statements which refer to all poles of the CSTO activity.

It is also important to understand to what extent we are adoptive to common problems. And when we speak about the positive experience of our work, we should clearly remember that the mutual respect, the aspiration of taking into consideration each other’s interests, the elaboration of consensus approaches, the support of the allies in complicated situation for reaching concrete results is the basis, on which our organization is built.

Colleagues,

The Council Meeting of the Parliamentary Assembly takes place in a period, when we stand before serious threats and challenges of the security. The world is at a crossroad of hard geopolitical events and transformations, which have irreversible consequences for many countries. And the zone of responsibility of the Collective Security also is not an exception.

It is known what events happened last year, and now I would like to provide information about the situation in the South Caucasus. The situation is rather tense. Despite all agreements, Azerbaijan continues the policy of threatening the territorial integrity of the Republic of Armenia, heats the situation up on the border with Armenia, in Nagorno Karabakh and in the Lachin Corridor.

After the illegal false-environmental blocking of the Lachin Corridor for 5 months, at the end of April Azerbaijan already officially blockaded Nagorno Karabakh. The decision of Baku on setting up a checkpoint in the zone of responsibility of the Russian peacekeeping troops in the Lachin Corridor is a gross violation of the trilateral statement of November 9, 2020 and decision having legal compulsory force of the UN International Court of Justice in February of this year.

It’s almost half a year that 120.000 Armenians of Nagorno Karabakh live in full blockade, in conditions of acute shortage of first necessity goods, medicine. Time and again the authorities of Azerbaijan restrict the move of the International Committee of the Red Cross vehicles and the movement of the ill people through the corridor.

In the context of the abovementioned, the real targeted statements and steps by the allies and colleagues, according to the restoration of the regime of the Lachin Corridor operation in accordance with the obligations of the trilateral statement and the principles of the international law, in the conditions of security and protection from illegal actions for regulating the life of Nagorno Karabakh are important for us.

Colleagues,

We follow the attempts of destroying the Armenian rich culture and eliminating the traces of Armenian identity by Azerbaijan. It is important to mention that the UN International Court of Justice also approved the availability of the threat of causing irreversible damage to the Armenians’ rights within the framework of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD).

Until now Baku rejects returning Armenian prisoners of war and the civilians being held as hostages conducting mock trials against them.

Colleagues,

I will refer to the process of regulation of relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan.

We repeatedly stated about readiness of Armenia on signing peace treaty and reciprocally recognizing the territorial integrity. However, Azerbaijan continues taking aggressive position.

A few days ago, the armed forces of Azerbaijan once again opened fire by using mortars and artillery to the direction of the sovereign territory of the Republic of Armenia, because of which there are casualties and wounded. Such development of the situation proves that the instigated coordinated provocations are aimed at disrupting the negotiating active processes for imposing pressure on Armenia. Such thing also happened yesterday.

During last three years, as a consequence of creeping military occupation tactics and wide-scale military operations by Azerbaijan against territorial integrity of Armenia, about 150km2 of the sovereign territory of the Republic of Armenia, which is the zone of responsibility of the CSTO was illegally occupied.

We regret that in our organization there is no common assessment to the fact of Azerbaijan’s aggression towards the sovereign territory of the Republic of Armenia, and the anti-legal presence of the invaded Azerbaijani armed forces on the internationally recognized territory of Armenia. In the context of the CSTO Observation Mission on the border with Azerbaijan, it was underlined that in order to have the mission effective for the country and the whole region, it is necessary to specify the zone of responsibility of the CSTO. The ambiguity of the colleagues’ positions is amazing, when there are undeniable facts of violations of internationally recognized borders of Armenia.

During our previous meeting also I warned my colleagues about the destabilizing perspectives of the policy pursued by Azerbaijan. Baku shows contempt to the international colleagues, with the presence and mediation the official Baku recognized the territorial integrity of the Republic of Armenia and assumed obligations also on the basis of Alma-Ata declaration in demarcation between the Republic of Armenia and the Republic of Azerbaijan.

Dear colleagues,

The establishment of peace in the region is the goal that pursues the Republic of Armenia. And the basis of stable peace, security and stable development of the region can only be the open and constructive dialogue. Since the past year Armenia and Turkey began regulation process of relations, but there are still no tangible results, and still many issues remain unsolved. We think that the regulation process should be without preconditions.

Concluding my speech, I would like once again to stress the importance of making diplomatic efforts. I call on all my colleagues who are interested in peace and stability of the present region, who have close relationship with Azerbaijan, to take practical steps on eliminating the violations of the international law and excluding the use of force. All these challenges require from all CSTO Member States to solve the existing issues through the use of the whole toolset of the organization, and the most important thing – to express clear positions on them without biased political preferences and priorities. If we are not able to do it together, tomorrow such challenges can arise for each of the CSTO Member State.

The peaceful development of the region has no alternative.

Thank you for attention.”