Azerbaijan says Armenian forces violate ceasefire regime in Nagorno-Karabakh 14 times

Armenian forces “violated ceasefire regime 14 times over the last 24 hours in different parts of the front,” Azerbaijani Defense Ministry said on Thursday.

“Positions of the Azerbaijani army were shelled from opposite positions on the territory of Armenia, as well as from settlements and heights in Nagorno-Karabakh and adjacent areas” controlled by Armenian forces, the defense ministry added.

On April 2, the situation in Nagorno-Karabakh rapidly deteriorated when the parties to the Karabakh conflict accused each other of violating truce along the front line. The claims came from defense authorities of Armenia and of Azerbaijan.

On April 5 Azerbaijan’s Chief of Staff Col. Gen. Nadjmeddin Sadykov and his Armenian counterpart Col. Gen. Yury Khachaturov in Moscow with Russia’s mediation. At the talks the sides reached an agreement on cessation of hostilities at the contact line between Azerbaijani and Armenian forces. On the same day, the defense ministries of the two countries announced that the ceasefire in Nagorno-Karabakh would start at 12am local time.

Though the ceasefire mostly holds, both sides continue to report occasional violations of ceasefire on the contact line in Nagorno-Karabakh.

On May 16 the presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan met in Vienna. Serzh Sargsyan and Ilham Aliyev agreed to “make steps to monitor observance of agreements on ceasefire and introduce a mechanism on investigating incidents.” They also agreed to “possible resume the negotiations process on settling the conflict,” the press service of the Armenian president said.

In the trilateral declaration adopted on June 20 after the meeting between the presidents of Russia, Armenia and Azerbaijan in St. Petersburg, the sides confirmed adherence to normalizing the situation on the contact line in Nagorno-Karabakh.