Sixty-fourth General Assembly

Plenary

119^thMeeting (PM)

General Assembly Defers Consideration of Draft Resolution Concerning Observance

of International Human Rights Law in ‘Occupied Territories of Azerbaijan’

 

Acting on a request by Azerbaijan, the General Assembly decided today to defer to its sixty-fifth session consideration of a draft resolution on “observance of international law and international human rights law in the occupied territories of Azerbaijan”.

Requesting the deferral, Agshin Mehdiyev (Azerbaijan) informed delegates that, after intensive consultations with the parties concerned, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) Minsk Group Co-Chairs announced that, between late September and mid-October, they would return to the region to conduct a field assessment mission that would observe the humanitarian situation in the territories.  A team of high-level advisers and experts, including representatives of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, was expected to accompany that international mission, the first in those territories since the OSCE fact-finding mission in early 2005.  He looked forward to informing the Assembly about the results of the visit.

The Minsk Process was started in 1992 by the former Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE) — now Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) — to provide an ongoing forum for negotiations towards a peaceful settlement of the crisis in the Nagorny Karabakh region.  The co-Chairmen of the Minsk Group are:  Bernard Fassier of France; Yuri Merzlyakov of the Russian Federation; and Robert Bradtke of the United States.

The General Assembly will reconvene at 3 p.m. today to consider a draft resolution on the request for an advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice on whether the unilateral declaration of independence of Kosovo is in accordance with international law.

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For information media • not an official record