US and Swiss astronauts on Azerbaijan's 'blacklist'

BAKU - The former United States astronaut Charles Duke and Swiss astronaut Claude Nicollier will be included in Azerbaijan's blacklist, spokesman of the Azerbaijan's Foreign Ministry Elman Abdullayev told media on Tuesday.

According to Abdullayev, the two astronauts will be denied visit to Azerbaijan, as they have traveled to Nagorno-Karabakh, a region which is officially part of Azerbaijan, but under Armenian control, without the approval of Azerbaijan.

"Traveling to the occupied territories of Azerbaijan without a permission of Azerbaijan is illegal," he said.

He explained that those who visited Nagorno-Karabakh and seven surrounding regions of Azerbaijan occupied by neighboring Armenia will be included in the "list of undesirable persons".

According to the Armenian media, Duke and Nicollier traveled to Nagorno Karabakh to take part in the conference titled "Human and Space" on Sept 16.

The landlocked mountainous region of Nagorno-Karabakh is the subject of an unresolved dispute between Azerbaijan, in which it lies, and its Armenian majority, backed by neighboring Armenia.

In 1988, towards the end of Soviet rule, Azerbaijani troops and Armenian secessionists began a bloody war which left this region in the hands of Armenians when a truce was signed in 1994.

Negotiations have so far failed to produce a permanent peace agreement, and the dispute remains one of post-Soviet Europe's "frozen conflicts".