Kerry pledges to help end conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh

WASHINGTON, June 3 (Xinhua) -- U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry pledged on Monday to continue efforts to help end the long- running conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh between Azerbaijan and Armenia.

Prior to a meeting with his Azerbaijani counterpart Elmar Mammadyarov at the State Department, Kerry said "This is a frozen conflict, as we call it, one that threatens the stability of the region and one that we need to deal with."

"The last thing we want is a return to war and to conflict," stressed the top American envoy, whose country co-chairs the Minsk Group of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe along with Russia and France, which has been mediating the conflict.

"I believe there is a path forward, and we will continue to work quietly and patiently in an effort to try to encourage the parties to be able to take either confidence-building measures that may get to further down the road, or to find a way towards a settlement with respect to this issue," Kerry added.

The Azerbaijani minister said he believed his country can move past the challenges with the help of the United States. "All the negative outcome of the conflict will be in the past, and we will look to the bright future of successful cooperation and living next to each other as a good neighborhood," he added.

Nagorno-Karabakh lies within Azerbaijan but has been controlled by Armenian troops and ethnic forces since a separatist war broke out in 1988. The two South Caucasus countries signed a cease-fire agreement in 1994 but skirmishes have broken out time and again despite repeated mediation by the Minsk Group.

Kerry is scheduled to meet with his Armenian counterpart Edward Nalbandian on Tuesday.