Cooperative Best Effort military exercises will likely not be conducted in Baku

The leadership of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization considers the question of changing the place for Cooperative Best Effort, the military exercises to be conducted within NATO's Partnership for Peace program in the summer of 2004. A competent source in Brussels told it to the Regnum news agency. The exercises were initially supposed to take place in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan.

As the source noted, the possible change of the place for the exercises is connected with the brutal murder committed in Budapest on February 19, when a lieutenant of the Armenian Armed Forces sent to Budapest to take English courses within the framework of Partnership for Peace was killed by an Azerbaijan officer who was taking the same courses. Another reason is the non-admission of the Armenian delegation to NATO' conference in Baku.

Armenian Ambassador to Benelux countries Vigen Chitechian, who also represents Armenia in NATO, expressed the Armenian side's indignation at the murder in Budapest during his meeting with Deputy Secretary General of NATO Minuto Rizzo. Chitechian's meeting with other top-ranking NATO officials, and possibly with NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, is also expected in the near future.

Editors note: See also the article "Azerbaijan officer kills Armenian colleague at NATO courses in Hungary".