I
would like to join previous speakers in congratulating
Mr. John William Ashe on his election as President of
the General Assembly at its sixty-eighth session and to
thank the outgoing President, Mr. Vuk Jeremi..
During the past two decades, the international
community has made great strides towards the
development of a cohesive approach aimed at
addressing the political, social and economic
challenges that the international community is facing
today. We need to analyse our commitments, keeping
in mind the difficulties that we have encountered while
implementing the Millennium Development Goals.
The world economic and financial crises are partially
responsible for our straying from the charted path.
However, they brought to light some of the underlying
issues that had either been overlooked or underestimated
and which turned out to be important for the overall
success.
We are all aware that, in the context of
interdependence and the growing interconnectedness
of the world economy, no country can achieve the
Millennium Development Goals in isolation. The
United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development
enriched our understanding of the ways of achieving
the overall progress towards the political, social and
economic development.
Armenia welcomes the inclusion of “The post-2015
development agenda: setting the stage” as the main
theme of our deliberations in the current session.
(spoke in English)
Despite the fact that most of us share the
understanding that the elimination of violence and
terror is essential for building peaceful, sustainable and
prosperous societies, peace seems to remain an elusive
phenomenon in many parts of the world.
Armenia remains alarmed by the worsening of the
humanitarian situation in Syria. The number of refugees
Armenia continues to receive already exceeds 10,000,
but tens of thousands of Syrian-Armenians remain in
Syria, a country that had become their second home
after the genocide of 1915, and they are struggling for
their survival in unbearable conditions together with
their fellow Syrians.
Armenia welcomes the unanimous adoption
yesterday of Security Council resolution 2118 (2013),
based on the agreement reached in Geneva between
Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov and United States
Secretary of State Kerry. The resolution could lead to
the elimination of chemical weapons and the exclusion
of their use in Syria and pave the way for a political
solution of the Syrian crisis, putting an end to the
suffering of the Syrian people.
It is our strong belief that there is no alternative
to the peaceful solution of conflicts. The resolution
of conflicts requires political will and determination.
Three months ago, on 18 June the Presidents of the
three co-Chair countries of the Minsk Group of the
Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe
(OSCE) — Russia, United States and France — made a
new statement on Nagorno Karabakh in the framework
of the Group of Eight Summit in Enniskillen.
In Armenia, we welcomed that statement and
affirmed that, like the co-Chairs, we continued to
believe that the elements outlined in the statements of
the Heads of State of the co-Chair countries over the
past five years can form the basis for reaching a fair and
lasting settlement of the conflict. We share the position
of the co-Chair countries that those elements should
be seen as an integrated whole and that any attempt
to select some elements over others would make it
impossible to achieve a solution. We absolutely agree
that peoples should be prepared for peace, not war.
Unfortunately, to date the Azerbaijani leadership has
been doing just the opposite, increasing warmongering
and anti-Armenian hate speech on a daily basis, even
using the lofty rostrum of the United Nations for its
purposes.
We absolutely agree with the Heads of the three
co-Chair countries — which are also three permanent
members of the Security Council — that the use of force
will not resolve the conflict and that only a negotiated
settlement can lead to peace and stability. However,
through its unprecedented accumulation of offensive
weaponry at a massive scale, Azerbaijan seriously
endangers regional and international security, despite
its membership in the Security Council.
Unlike Azerbaijan, Armenia has on several
occasions reiterated its commitment to the principles
of international law and, in response to the Enniskillen
appeal of the Presidents of the United States, the Russian
Federation and France, once again reaffirmed that
commitment, particularly with respect to the non-use
of force or the threat of force, equal rights and the self-
determination of peoples and territorial integrity.
Azerbaijan keeps misinterpreting the 1993
resolutions of the Security Council — resolutions 822
(1993), 853 (1993), 874 (1993) and 884 (1993) — the
core requirement of which was the immediate cessation
of all hostilities and hostile acts and the establishment
of a durable ceasefire. Azerbaijan has not only failed
to comply with the latter requirement, but further
intensified its aggression and the military operations
against Nagorno Karabakh and Armenia using
mercenaries closely linked to notorious terrorist
organizations. It is not surprising that since the
ceasefire agreement was signed in 1994, the mediators,
the three permanent members of the Security Council,
have never made another reference to those resolutions.
Azerbaijan is acting as if the international
community shared its approach and as if it shared
the approach of the international community. In
reality, Azerbaijan continuously rejects all proposals
of the internationally mandated OSCE Minsk Group
co-Chair countries. Baku has rejected all versions of
the Basic Principles of the settlement of the Nagorno
Karabakh conflict proposed by the co-Chairs of the
OSCE Minsk Group, including those presented at
the Kazan, Sochi, Astrakhan and Saint Petersburg
summits. Baku refuses not only the Basic Principles,
but also the confidence-building measures proposed
by the co-Chairs on consolidation of the ceasefire,
withdrawal of the snipers from the line of contact and
the establishment of a mechanism for investigating
ceasefire violations. Azerbaijan not only obstructs
confidence-building measures, but also periodically
organizes provocations on the line of contact with
Nagorno Karabakh and on the border with Armenia,
which has resulted in new casualties.
At the previous session of the General Assembly
(see A/67/PV.19), I spoke about the Azerbaijani
leadership’s release and glorification of an axe-murderer
named Ramil Safarov, which was strongly condemned
by the entire international community and by the
human rights commissions of the United Nations and
other international organizations. Even today, more
than a year after Safarov’s release, the Azerbaijani
leadership continues to declare that what they did is
just and right and dares to criticize the stance of the
international community. That clearly demonstrates the
deepening gap between the Azerbaijani leadership and
the international community in terms of perceptions of
what is good and what is bad.
Most recently, Azerbaijani authorities at the
national level have ostracized the eminent Azerbaijani
writer Akram Aylisli for publishing a novel in which he
talks about the pogroms against Armenians in Baku,
Sumgait and other parts of Azerbaijan. Aylisli’s books
were publicly burned, and the writer had to leave the
country after receiving death threats.
Just last week the Azerbaijani leadership once
again came up with new threats against Armenia and
Nagorno Karabakh and made claims to Armenian
territories, including its nearly 3,000-year-old capital
city, Yerevan. Notwithstanding Azerbaijan’s destructive
stance, Armenia will continue to make efforts towards
the settlement of the Nagorno Karabakh conflict
exclusively through peaceful means and on the basis
of the purposes and principles and norms set forth in
the United Nations Charter and the provisions of the
statements made by the Presidents of the three co-Chair
countries’ at L’Aquila, Muskoka, Deauville, Los Cabos
and Enniskillen.
In March, the Human Rights Council adopted
by consensus a resolution initiated by Armenia and
co-sponsored by over 60 countries on the prevention
of genocide. The recognition, condemnation and
prevention of genocide remain a priority for Armenia,
and we will take the necessary actions to prevent new
occurrences of the crime of genocide, while keeping the
issue of responsibility for crimes against humanity and
the denial thereof high on its agenda. As the nation that
survived the first genocide of the twentieth century,
Armenia unequivocally welcomes the clear position
adopted by the States Members of the United Nations
that precludes any possibility of immunity or pardon
for perpetrators of crimes against humanity.
In May 2013, Armenia assumed the chairmanship
of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe,
a regional organization that is a key partner of the
United Nations in our shared global quest to advance
the principles of fundamental freedoms, the defence
and promotion of human rights and the continuous
efforts for peace and security.
Cooperation between the two organizations is also
well established in the fight against racism, xenophobia,
hate speech and intolerance. Those issues are also
among the priorities established during Armenia’s
chairmanship, elaborated in response to the challenges
that Member States of both the United Nations and the
Council of Europe are facing today.
Armenia is committed to strengthening the
institutional capacities of the United Nations. In that
regard, we support the United Nations reform process
and are ready to contribute to it. We believe that the
reforms provide an opportunity to enhance the role of
the Organization in addressing the crucial issues facing
the world.