Negotiations to resolve the conflict peacefully have been ongoing since 1992 under the aegis of the Minsk Group of the OSCE.

Since 1997, the Minsk Group Co-Chairs have presented three proposals to serve as a framework for resolving the conflict.

Beginning in 1999, the Presidents of Azerbaijan and Armenia initiated a direct dialogue through a series of face-to-face meetings, often facilitated by the Minsk Group Co-Chairs.

Finland is an active participant in the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe ( OSCE ) and in early 1995 assumed the co-chairmanship of the OSCE's Minsk Group on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

Coalition government led by Prime Minister Ylli Bufi takes office ; Tenth Party Congress of the Albanian Party of Labor meets and renames party the Socialist Party of Albania ( SPA ); Albania accepted as a full member of the OSCE Minsk Group ; James Baker, Secretary of State of the United States, visits Albania.

OSCE Minsk Group

* 50px OSCE Minsk Group: The OSCE Minsk Group ( composed of negotiators from the US, Russia and France to encourage a peaceful, negotiated resolution to the conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh ) stated that Azerbaijan's pardoning of a military officer who murdered an Armenian officer has harmed attempts to establish peace between the countries.

*: On September 3, the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued the following statement: " In Russia, which is the co-chairman of the OSCE Minsk Group on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict settlement, received reports with deep concern regarding the clemency of Baku Azeri serviceman Ramil Safarov, who was sentenced to life imprisonment for the commission of the murder of an Armenian officer with an extreme atrocity in Hungary in the 2004, as well as regarding the preceded decision of the Hungarian authorities to extradite him to Azerbaijan.

We believe that these actions of Azerbaijan, as well as the Hungarian authorities to run counter to the efforts agreed at international level, particularly through the OSCE Minsk Group, directed to reduce tension in the region.

As one of the OSCE Minsk Group countries, France is " strongly committed to a peaceful solution to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, believes that this decision risks seriously damaging the negotiation efforts and the establishment of a climate of trust between the parties.

The ES EVM were developed in Moscow, at the Scientific-Research Center for Electronic Computer Machinery ( НИЦЭВТ ), in Yerevan, and later in Minsk, Belarus, at the Scientific-Research Institute of Electronic Computer Machines ( НИИ ЭВМ ), in Penza Scientific-Research Institute of Computer Machinery ( Пензенский НИИВТ ) and manufactured in Minsk, at Minsk Production Group for Computing Machinery ( Минское производственное объединение вычислительной техники ( МПО ВТ )), in Penza, at Penza Electronic Computer Plant ( Пензенский завод ВЭМ ).

They were manufactured in Minsk as well, at Minsk Production Group for Computing Machinery ( Минское производственное объединение вычислительной техники ( МПО ВТ )).

* Jacques Faure ( ambassador ), French co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group

Pavlov's Western Front, which had collapsed under the weight of the attack by the Wehrmacht's Army Group Centre during the Battle of Białystok – Minsk.

On 4 July, 2BF was tasked with mopping up the remains of Army Group Centre's Fourth Army under the command of General von Tippelskirch and the remains of the Ninth Army in a large pocket southeast of Minsk.

Minsk has a digital metropolitan network ; waiting lists for telephones are long ; fixed line penetration is improving although rural areas continue to be undeserved ; intercity-Belarus has developed fibre-optic backbone system presently serving at least 13 major cities ( 1998 ); Belarus's fibre optics form synchronous digital hierarchy rings through other countries ' systems ; an inadequate analogue system remains operational.

Internet access in Belarus is predominantly urban, with 60 percent of users living in the capital Minsk.

Among the Internal Troops formations is the 3rd Red Banner separate special purpose Brigade ( V / Ch 3214, located in Minsk, in the district Uruchcha, " Uruchenskaya Brigade ").

* 1944 – World War II: Minsk is liberated from Nazi control by Soviet troops during Operation Bagration.

* October 12 – Polish – Soviet War: After the Polish army captures Tarnopol, Dubno, Minsk, and Dryssa, the ceasefire is enforced.

Minsk (, ) is the capital and largest city of Belarus, situated on the Svislač and Niamiha rivers.

As the national capital, Minsk has a special administrative status in Belarus and is the administrative centre of Minsk Region ( voblast ) and Minsk raion ( district ).

Minsk is located on the southeastern slope of the Minsk Hills, a region of rolling hills running from the southwest ( upper reaches of the river Nioman ) to the northeast – that is, to Lukomskaye Lake in northwestern.

Minsk is located in the area of mixed forests typical of most of Belarus.

Artesian drinking water ( total volume of drinking water – more than 60 %) is consumed in Minsk ’ s city districts.

There is also a region historically known as Black Ruthenia ( Black Russia, Чорная Русь / Chornaya Rus ’), it covers northwestern lands of modern-day Belarus: Hrodna, Slonim, Navahrudak, Vaukavysk and partly Minsk region.

The Belarusian Peasant Party, founded in February 1991, is headquartered in Minsk and has branches in most voblastsi.

Smolensk is located on the M1 main highway and main railway between Moscow and Minsk.

Other Belarusian cities ’ names are formed on these lines: for example, Minsk ’ s name is derived from the river Menka, Polotsk ’ s – from the Palata river, Vitebsk ’ s – from the Vitba river.

In 1535 – 1565 Gomel is the centre of starostwo, from 1565 Gomel is in the Rechitsa Powiat of the Minsk Voivodeship.

Gomel is situated in the southeastern part of the country, on the right bank of Sozh river, to the South-East from Minsk, to the East from Brest, to the South from Mogilev, to the West from Bryansk and to the North from Chernihiv.

The local airport ( code BQT ), is operating flights to the capital city Minsk and to Moscow and Novgorod in Russia on a weekly basis.

Apart from Magdeburg itself, notable towns based on Magdeburg Law ( or its local variants ) were Biecz, Frysztak, Sandomierz, Kraków, Kurów, Minsk, Polotsk, Poznań, Ropczyce, Łódź, Wrocław, Szczecin, Złotoryja, Vilnius, Trakai, Kaunas, Hrodna, Kiev, Lviv, Czernowitz ( currently Chernivtsi in Ukraine ), Brody, Lutsk, Volodymyr-Volynskyi, Sanok, Sniatyn, Nizhyn, Bardejov, Humenné and Krupina, among others.

Terminal 1 ( or Sheremetyevo-1 ) currently caters mainly to internal low-cost flights and flights to Minsk ( Belarus ).

Zbyněk Irgl ( born November 29, 1980 ) is a Czech professional ice hockey player currently with HC Dinamo Minsk of the Kontinental Hockey League ( KHL ).

Kanstancin Jaŭhenavič Kalcoŭ (, ) ( born April 17, 1981 in Minsk, BSSR ( now Belarus )) is a professional ice hockey player who currently plays for Salavat Yulaev Ufa.

* Independence Day, celebrates the liberation of Minsk from Nazi occupation by Soviet troops in 1944.

* Lee Harvey Oswald's journey from Minsk to the US, travelling through Holland by Perry Vermeulen

The Soviet Union assisted German air forces by allowing them to use signals broadcast by the Soviet radio station at Minsk allegedly " for urgent aeronautical experiments ".

* 1943 – World War II: Start of the liquidation of the Ghettos in Minsk and Lida by the Nazis.

The head of the German civil administration in Belarus, Generalkomissar Wilhelm Kube, who among other crimes personally murdered Jewish children, objected to the deportation of German Jews to the Minsk ghetto " who come from our own cultural circle " where they were being casually killed by German soldiers.

Minsk was captured by German troops on 21 February 1918.

When Vilnius was captured by Polish forces on 17 April 1919, the capital of the Soviet puppet state Litbel was moved to Minsk.

This met with a Red Army counter-offensive that drove into Polish territory almost to Warsaw, Minsk itself was re-captured by the Soviet Red Army on 11 July 1920 and a new Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic was declared on 31 July 1920.

Minsk was captured by the Germans on 28 June 1941.

On 22 June 1944 the huge Soviet offensive Operation Bagration was launched, Minsk was re-captured on 3 July 1944, and all of Belarus was regained by the end of August.

* The conflict over the Nagorno-Karabakh region dealt with by the OSCE Minsk Conference — Report by rapporteur David Atkinson presented to Political Affairs Committee of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe

In March stun grenades were used by Belorussian police in Minsk against demonstrators, and again in September they were used by Greek police in Athens.

Moshe's apostasy is denied by Chabad apologists, but verified by Belorussian State archives in Minsk uncovered by historian Shaul Stampfer.

During the War, the Russian Western Front's Great Retreat in August / September 1915 ended with the lands of Grodno and most of Vilno guberniyas occupied by Germany, and a front at 100 kilometres to the west of Minsk.

The Bolshevik All-Russian council of Soviets declared the creation of the Western Oblast which consisted of the Vilno, Vitebsk, Mogilev and Minsk guberniyas ( or parts unoccupied by German troops ) to administer the Belarusian lands in the pre-front zone.

Building of the castle was completed by Duke Ilinich in the early 16th century near village Mir ( formerly of Minsk guberniya ).

According to the newspaper Soviet Byelorussia, President Lukashenko decided on the anthem on June 12, 2002 and chose to have its first performance on July 3, Belarusian independence day, the anniversary of the date in 1944 when the Wehrmacht was driven away from Minsk by the Red Army.