News - Miller on Armenia-Azerbaijan talks: The parties themselves should come to some kind of settlement

The U.S. Secretary of State held direct talks with the President of Azerbaijan, and the Prime Minister of Armenia, and a number of our officials visited the region not only during the last week or 10 days when the hostilities began but also several months ago. US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller stated today at a briefing.  "We have done our best to find a diplomatic solution, but at the end of the day, we must not forget that there are two sides here that simply have differences. We can do our best to bring them closer together, but at the end of the day they're going to have to agree to talk to each other and eventually come to some kind of settlement. That's what we're going to do, continue to play our role in supporting that process," he said. The U.S. Secretary of State also responded to a question about Russia's role in what is happening in Artsakh. In his view, Russia has not played any effective role in Nagorno-Karabakh over the past week. "There have been times when we've seen them contribute to the negotiations and we've welcomed that, but certainly in the past week their role in this situation has not been effective," he said.