Statement delivered by Ambassador Armen Papikyan at the 944th Meeting of the Forum for Security Co-operation in response to the Opening Address by the Minister for Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Dmytro Kuleba

29 April, 2020

Mr. Chairman,

From the outset let me warmly welcome H.E. Mr. Dmytro Kuleba, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine and thank him for outlining priorities of the Ukrainian FSC Chairmanship, of which we took positive note of. We wish we could have welcomed the Minister in person here in Vienna but given the current challenging circumstances and limitations, to which we all should adapt ourselves, we will do our utmost to ensure the smooth and effective work of the Forum for Security Co-operation (FSC) and, indeed of the OSCE in general. Anyway, let me assure you, Minister, that you can count on the support of the Armenian Delegation during the Ukrainian FSC Chairmanship. We will actively engage in a constructive and, as always, the FSC mandate driven manner around the priorities and other issues in the course of our discussions and deliberations.

Mr. Chairman,

Now I would like to touch upon some points, that I believe are worthy of consideration.

The COVID-19 pandemic, which does not recognize boundaries, borders, line of contacts, conflicts or crisis, challenged the usual working methods of the OSCE respective mechanisms. At this juncture it might be difficult to fully assess the security implications and long-term effects, therefore we welcome the Chairmanship’s proposal to focus on short- and long-term impact of the pandemic during the upcoming Security Dialogue. This pandemic showed that we should build strong solidarity, and we should reach people on the ground, especially in conflict affected areas, in a status-neutral manner, regardless of political or other circumstances. Armenia was among the first countries that supported the appeal of the UN SG for immediate global ceasefire in all corners of the globe which is of utmost importance. Notwithstanding, we have seen the blatant violations of the established ceasefire in the absence of monitoring mechanisms. Such actions have no justification and manifest total disregard to the calls of international community. We believe that the FSC is the right platform to discuss these issues.

We also welcome the idea to organize a joint FSC-PC meeting on the UNSCR 1325, which is considered as the cornerstone of the agenda of Women, Peace and Security. This agenda is one of the most important steps towards gender mainstreaming in security sector and ensuring the protection and participation of women.

The implementation of the Vienna Document is another topic that has particular importance against the backdrop of current situation. The violations of this document have a potential to discredit and undermine the whole architecture of CSBMs in the OSCE area and create major threat to regional security and transparency. Therefore, it is very important to keep this topic high on the agenda of the FSC. We regret that due to the circumstances there was no opportunity to discuss this topic during the outgoing FSC Chairmanship.

Mr. Chairman,

This delegation has been persistent in voicing its principled position with regards the attempts of enhancing the FSC agenda through inclusion of topics and items which are beyond of the FSC mandate. We have raised this issue before, and we are very much bewildered to see such issues in the Indicative schedule repeating the agenda of the previous chairman. In this context, we once again reiterate our opposition on any deviation from the mandate of the FSC and we expect that in coming months we will concentrate on core issues of the FSC.

Furthermore, we hope that the Ukrainian FSC Chairmanship will continue the well-established practice and will lead the work of the Forum in a balanced and neutral manner taking into account the interests of all participating States and serving for the benefit of our organization.

Before concluding, Mr. Chairman, we would like to welcome Germany, the new member of the FSC troika and once again thank Minister Kuleba for his presentation and wish Ukrainian FSC Chairmanship good luck and every success during its tenure.

Thank you.

MFA RA
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