"Three Azerbaijani soldiers were killed in heavy fighting" with Armenian forces across the front line of breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh, Azerbaijan's defense ministry said in a statement.
Yerevan and Baku are locked in a decades-long conflict over the breakaway region of Nagorny Karabakh, a Yerevan-backed ethnic Armenian enclave in Azerbaijan.
The two ex-Soviet nations regularly exchange fire along their shared border and across Nagorny Karabakh's volatile front line.
In an escalation unprecedented since the 1994 ceasefire, both sides have reportedly used large-caliber artillery in tit-for-tat attacks in recent days, raising the specter of a new all-out war.
On Saturday, Armenia threatened Azerbaijan with "retaliatory" artillery and rocket strikes, and accused Baku of breaching the shaky truce.
Yerevan had said Thursday that Azerbaijan shelled its territory with large-caliber artillery, killing three civilian women, while on Friday, the ethnic Armenian rebel authorities in Karabakh accused Azerbaijan of killing four of its soldiers.
Azerbaijan's foreign ministry accused Armenia of "turning civilians into a target by deliberately stationing its firing positions in and around civilian facilities to shell positions of the Azerbaijani armed forces."
International mediators to Nagorno-Karabakh peace talks held under the aegis of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe on Saturday "condemned in strong terms the use of artillery that caused additional casualties," and called on both countries to "accept an OSCE mechanism to investigate ceasefire violations".
Ethnic Armenian separatists backed by Yerevan seized control of the territory during a 1990s war that left some 30,000 dead.
Despite years of negotiations, the two countries have not signed a final peace deal to cement a tenuous ceasefire.
Energy-rich Azerbaijan, whose military spending exceeds Armenia's entire state budget, has threatened to take back the breakaway region by force if negotiations fail to yield results.
Armenia -- backed by Russia, which sells weapons to both Baku and Yerevan -- says it could crush any offensive.
AFP
dailystar.com.lb
28/9/15
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Related:
OSCE Co-Chairs Recognize Artsakh (Арцах) People’s Right to Shape Own Future. (Parliamentary elections are taking place May 3 in Nagorno-Karabakh)
Statement by the Spokesperson on Nagorno-Karabakh (EEAS 01.05.15)
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Fatal clashes between Azerbaijan and Armenia-backed Karabakh stir tension...
ReplyDeleteAzerbaijan and the Armenia-backed breakaway region of Nagorno-Karabakh on Monday bickered about how many of their soldiers had been killed in clashes which have stoked fears of a wider conflict breaking out in the South Caucasus.
Violence erupted last week with both sides accusing one other of starting the trouble, of using heavy weapons, and of killing each other's soldiers in an area that is crisscrossed by oil and gas pipelines.
In an account that was disputed, Armenia said Azeri forces had also attacked several villages near the border between the two former Soviet republics, killing three civilians.
On Monday, the Azeri defense ministry said three of its soldiers had been killed in the fighting, and that seven Armenian-backed soldiers from Karabakh had also been killed with many more wounded.
That assertion was challenged by the ministry of defense in Nagorno-Karabakh. It said that more than 10 Azeri soldiers had been killed and several more wounded, denying it had suffered any casualties......Reuters.........todayonline.com