BAKU (Itar-Tass)–Azeri President Gaidar Aliyev had a telephone conversation with his French counterpart Jacques Chirac on Friday to discuss the development of bilateral relations and Chirac’s upcoming visit to Baku.
The presidential press service said on Saturday that Aliyev and Chirac also exchanged views on ways to settle the Karabakh conflict–the activity of the OSCE Minsk Group on Nagorno-Karabakh and the resumption of Armenian-Azeri peace talks.
The French president stressed the need to observe the principles of the Lisbon summit in order to settle the conflict. Among those principles are resolutions to recognize territorial integrity of Azerbaijan and Armenia–to grant Nagorno-Karabakh an autonomy and to ensure guarantees to all citizens in the region.
The press service said that Aliyev expressed gratitude to Chirac and his wife Bernadette for their invitation to attend a concert organized by Mstislav Rostropovich to be held in Paris on Tuesday. He regretted that the situation in the country will not allow him to attend the concert.