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First entry: Saturday, October 17, 2020, 4:54 pm
At least 12 people were killed and more than 40 injured in a rocket attack in Ganja, Azerbaijan’s second-largest city, a long way from Nagorno-Karabakh, where clashes have broken out between Armenian separatists and Azeri forces. September, according to the Baku authorities.
The attacks also hit Stepanakert, the capital of the separatist-controlled enclave, and authorities said two civilians had been injured so far.
Hikmat Hajiyev, an adviser to Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, said on Twitter that “according to initial reports, more than 20 houses have been destroyed.”
A rocket hit an apartment building in Ganja, where a resident told Agence France-Presse he saw at least seven victims being pulled out of the rubble.
Subsequently, the Azerbaijani prosecutor’s office said that according to the information it has gathered so far, twelve civilians were killed and 40 others were injured. Search and rescue operations are still continuing.
Ganja had already been bombed by Armenian separatists on October 11. Authorities said at the time that 10 people died and 34 were injured.
The bombing came hours after Stepanakert was hit for the first time last Friday.
Stepanakert has come under heavy bombardment since hostilities between Yerevan-backed separatist forces in the enclave and Turkish-backed Azerbaijani forces resumed on September 27. The bombings have turned it into a ghost town, since most of its inhabitants have abandoned it.
In Ganja, French Agency reporters saw houses damaged by rockets or missiles and rescue teams transporting people on stretchers (it was not clear whether they were alive or dead) and recovering dismembered human limbs.
The attack took place around 03:00 (local time; midnight Greek time Friday to Saturday). Neighbors came out of their homes terrified, some with tears in their eyes, others in pajamas and slippers.
Dozens of rescuers searched the wreckage for barefoot survivors overnight.
According to city dwellers, more than twenty people lived in a building hit by a rocket.
A resident said he saw a child, two women and four men being pulled out of the rubble, with some of the victims mutilated.
“One woman lost both legs.” Someone lost an arm, “said Elmir Sirinzandai, 26, a resident.
AFP reporters in the nearby town of Mingetsevir, about an hour’s drive north of Ganja, said they heard a powerful explosion that shook the building around the same time.
Mingchevir is protected by anti-missile systems because it has a strategic infrastructure, a hydroelectric plant. It is unclear if the rockets were destroyed in flight or if the city has been hit so far.
Sources: AMPE, AFP, Sputnik, TASS
