Conference on conflict settlement in GUAM countries starts in Baku

A conference on settling frozen conflicts on the soil of the countries of GUAM (Georgia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan and Moldova), joined by governmental officials and international experts started in Baku on Tuesday,15 April, Info-Prim Neo reports. R. Moldova is represented by Reintegration deputy minister Ion Stavila, as delegations from Turkey, Latvia, Poland, Romania and Bulgaria are also expected. In 2007, the GUAM countries submitted a draft resolution on “the frozen conflicts” in GUAM and their results for the international peace, security and development to UN. The four call on the other nations to confirm the territorial integrity of the countries, where separatist-spirited ethic groups have been kept since the Soviet period - Nagorno-Karabakh in Azerbaijan, Abkhazia and Tzkhinvali (South Ossetia) regions of Georgia and the Transnistrian region in Moldova. Azerbaijan, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine have noted in the draft resolution that the lingering conflicts continue to threaten the peace and stability in the respective regions, calling on countries to assist in the conflict resolution processes in the GUAM area. A month ago, in an interview for a Russian publication, Moldova’s President Vladimir Voronin hinted Moldova could leave this regional organization, not benevolently eyed by Russia. Last week at a news conference deputy premier Andrei Stratan said the problem of leaving GUAM is not yet raised, although the Chisinau authorities find modest results in the activity of this structure. Ukraine’s Rada ratified, early in March, the statute of the Democracy and Economic Development Organization GUAM, what made Ukrainian speaker, Arseni Yatsenyuk state „Ukraine has definitely got the status of a regional leader.” Georgia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan and Moldova, established the GUAM format in 1997. In 1999, Uzbekistan had joined the organization, but four years later left it. The next GUAM summit is expected in June 2008, to take place in Tbilisi, Georgia.