WARSAW/ANKARA (AA) - Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said late on Sunday that he had no appointment with Armenian President Robert Kocharian.
Erdogan, who is currently in Polish capital of Warsaw to attend the Summit of Council of Europe (COE) Heads of State and Government, met Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, who earlier met Kocharian on the margin of this summit.
Regarding the Upper Karabakh dispute between Armenia and Azerbaijan, Erdogan said, ''we are carefully monitoring steps for resolution of this problem. We hope that problems would be overcome as soon as possible, and peace would be settled in our region.''
Asked if he would take a step for resolution of Upper Karabakh dispute by meeting Kocharian, Erdogan said, ''we don't have a scheduled meeting.''
On the other hand, Aliyev said that two countries (Turkey & Azerbaijan) would continue to support each other.
Asked if he saw any milder attitude from Armenia for solution of this dispute, Aliyev said, ''this matter has been discussed for years, and so we have decided not to talk on this matter before we make a real progress. I hope negotiations will bear positive result, and our problems will be solved.''
-COE SUMMIT-
Before he flew to Warsaw, Erdogan told reporters that he would make two presentations on ''European unity-European values'' and ''European Architecture'' at the summit.
Erdogan recalled that Turkey was a member of the COE since it was established in 1949 and said, ''we will discuss proposals to solve old and new problems our continent is facing and determine strategic methods that COE will pursue in coming days.''
Noting that an action plan and declaration were expected to be adopted during the summit, Erdogan said, ''these documents will include common solution methods agreed by the COE member states to solve our continent's problems.''
''I will also have the opportunity to share our country's views on COE and future of Europe with the participating heads of state and government,'' added Erdogan.
(BRC-MS)
2005-05-16