Azerbaijan urged the U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday to intervene in a long and bitter territorial dispute with neighboring Armenia over its breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region. But France, Russia and the United States, which have been trying to resolve the dispute on behalf of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, asked the assembly to stay on the sidelines and not interfere with their efforts. Talks \"can only progress in an atmosphere of confidence between the parties. Anything in the direction of building confidence and of avoiding a division of the General Assembly is helpful,\" said U.S. envoy Susan Moore, speaking on behalf of the OSCE initiative led by Paris, Moscow and Washington. Rival claims have hung for years over tiny, mountainous Nagorno-Karabakh, a mainly ethnic Armenian enclave inside Azerbaijan. Azerbaijan suffered a humiliating defeat in a 1988-94 war with Armenia over the region after its inhabitants tried to break from Azeri rule. An estimated 35,000 people were killed and one million refugees fled to Azerbaijan, where they remain. At the same time, thousands of ethnic Armenian refugees fled to Armenia. A cease-fire ended the conflict but the dispute persists despite international efforts to broker a deal. Azerbaijan\'s foreign minister, Elmar Mammadyarov, said his government had decided to take the issue to the General Assembly because Armenia was pursuing an \"illegal settlement policy\" by flooding the disputed area with Armenians, with an eye to annexing the enclave. He called on the assembly to adopt a resolution affirming its \"continued strong support\" for Azerbaijan\'s territorial integrity and the right of Azeri refugees to return to their former homes in the enclave. But Armenian Ambassador Armen Martirosyan said Azerbaijan\'s proposal was aimed at torpedoing the OSCE-sponsored negotiations. The assembly put off a vote on the draft resolution until an unspecified later date. (Reuters)