We recognize the important and valuable work of the Office in Yerevan and do not have plans or intentions to close it.
OSCE Chairperson-in-Office: We do not have intentions to close Office in Yerevan
STEPANAKERT, JANUARY 20, ARTSAKHPRESS: Austrian Foreign Minister, Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) Chairperson-in-Office, Sebastian Kurz told the abovementioned to Mediamax news agency of Armenia.
“The OSCE is a consensus-based organization, which means that all 57 participating States have an equal voice in all kinds of decisions – including those on mandates of field operations,” said Kurz. “Facilitating consensus as an honest broker is therefore one of the main tasks of any OSCE Chairmanship. This is why we promptly resumed consultations and negotiations after our Chairmanship started. The active, constructive engagement and support of each and every participating State is critical in this regard. In fact, it is our common interest and responsibility to guarantee the good functioning of the entire organization.
“We are aware of the current speculations and assumptions on the field missions’ issue, and this interest is only natural. We recognise the important and valuable work of the Office in Yerevan and do not have plans or intentions to close it.”
As reported earlier, the activities of the OSCE Office in Yerevan are temporarily “hanging in the air” until consensus is reached on the extension of its mandate.
According to the current practice, the mandates of the national offices of this organization are extended every year, and on the basis of consensus among the OSCE member countries.
Later, however, it became known that Azerbaijan is preventing this consensus. Subsequently, the then German Chairmanship at the OSCE issued a statement indicating that the reasons, which Azerbaijan had given for its blocking the extension of the mandate of the OSCE Office in Yerevan, were unfounded.
