U.S. Official In Azerbaijan For Talks On Karabakh, Human Rights

Azerbaijani President Aliyev (left) with French President Jacques Chirac at talks on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict on February 10. (epa)

March 14, 2006 -- The U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Europe and Asia, Daniel Freed, has arrived in Baku for talks expected to focus on human rights and Azerbaijan's territorial dispute with neighboring Armenia.

Freed today met with rights campaigners and representatives of Azerbaijan's civil society at the U.S. ambassador's residence in Baku.

After the meeting, rights campaigner Rena Sadaddinova told Azerbaijan's Turan news agency that the discussion focused on last November's disputed parliamentary polls, human rights violations, the issue of political prisoners, and the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

Freed was scheduled to meet later today with President Ilham Aliyev and Azerbaijani businessmen.

Freed will later fly to neighboring Armenia. From there he will proceed to Istanbul to attend a meeting of the Minsk Group of nations that have been mandated by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe to help Armenia and Azerbaijan settle the 18-year-old Karabakh dispute.

(Turan, APA)