Response to the Report of the Chairperson-in-Office
As delivered by Political Officer Bahram Rajaee
to the Permanent Council, Vienna
October 20, 2022
The United States strongly supports the activation of the OSCE’s confidence-building and conflict prevention instruments, including the establishment of a needs assessment team on the territory of Armenia. We urge Armenia and Azerbaijan to take urgent steps to deescalate tensions, build confidence, and move forward with the peace process. As both sides know, the United States strongly supports a comprehensive and sustainable peace process and is committed to working bilaterally, with close partners like the European Union, and through international organizations such as the OSCE.
We, the participating States, have given the Organization and the Chair a series of tools to help avert conflict in Ministerial Council Decision 3/2011. In that decision we all recalled that the OSCE, as a regional arrangement under Chapter VIII of the Charter of the United Nations and as a primary organization for the peaceful settlement of disputes within its region, is a key instrument for early warning, conflict prevention and resolution, and crisis management.
When one participating State asks for assistance on its own territory – for the sake of transparency and to support an ongoing peace process — we believe the organization has an obligation to consider the request.
The recent violations of the ceasefire on September 13 and 14, and again on September 28, remain of grave concern to the United States. The United States encourages Armenia and Azerbaijan to strictly adhere to a sustainable ceasefire, pull back and distance their armed forces, and continue negotiations on border delimitation to support a peaceful resolution.
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