12 May 2011
The president of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly, Petros Efthymiou, is visiting Azerbaijan, after two days of talks in Armenia.
President Ilham Aliyev received the Greek MP on Thursday.
They discussed cooperation between Azerbaijan and the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly and settlement of the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh the presidential press service reported.
Earlier in the day, Efthymiou met Ogtay Asadov, chairman of Azerbaijan's parliament, the Milli Majlis.
Asadov said that integration with Europe was a foreign policy priority for Azerbaijan and that the country worked closely with the OSCE and its Parliamentary Assembly.
The assembly president in turn described Azerbaijan as an important regional player as well as an OSCE member.
"Therefore, this visit is very important for us. The OSCE is a very important political forum. The OSCE holds quite productive discussions and exchanges of experience in the Parliamentary Assembly. We believe that our mutual visits and meetings have great significance for the development of our ties," Efthymiou said.
The meeting shared views on the development of relations between the OSCE and Azerbaijan and the OSCE's role as a mediator to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.
Petros Efthymiou also had a meeting with the Azerbaijani delegation to the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly, led by Azerbaijan's deputy speaker, Bahar Muradova.
Muradova thanked him for his support for Azerbaijan's territorial integrity and urged the Parliamentary Assembly to adopt a resolution on the Armenian-occupied Nagorno-Karabakh region.
Delegation member Eldar Ibrahimov said it was important for the OSCE's Karabakh mediators, the co-chairs of the Minsk Group, to report to the Parliamentary Assembly.
Petros Efthymiou replied that he would try to invite the co-chairs to the summer session of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly to give a report on their work.
He stressed that the OSCE supports a peaceful and just resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh problem.
At the start of his visit, Petros Efthymiou told journalists his visit would discus security, the economy, environment, human rights, democracy and resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and focus on developing relations between Azerbaijan and the OSCE.
