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Russian forces in the Karabakh region
For the first time since the announcement of the ceasefire agreement in the Nagorno Karabakh region, the Russian military announced on Saturday that there had been a violation of the agreement, which in November ended the battles between Azerbaijan and Armenia in the region. .
The Russian Defense Ministry, which deployed peacekeepers to the region, said in a statement on Saturday: “On December 11, a violation of the ceasefire agreement was reported in the Ghadrut region.”
These statements came at a time when the Armenian army announced “attacks” by Azerbaijan against the villages of Khtsabird and En-Takhir, which remained under the control of forces from the Nagorno-Karabakh region.
In a statement, the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry condemned the Armenian “provocations” and stressed that “appropriate countermeasures” would be taken. According to this source, “for the moment the ceasefire is being respected.”
A spokesman for the Russian peacekeepers confirmed to the RIA Novosti news agency on Saturday that there was an exchange of fire from automatic weapons, noting that the two sides asked to respect the ceasefire.
This is the first time that Russia has denounced a violation of the ceasefire in the region since an agreement on the matter was reached on 10 November.
Also on Saturday, the co-chairs of the French group “Minsk”, Stephan Visconti and the American Andrew Scoffer, met with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev in Baku, and are expected to arrive in Yerevan on Sunday.
The group led the negotiations on Nargorny Karabakh for decades, but was unable to reach an agreement on the disputed territory.
Hours earlier, Nargorni Karabakh forces announced that three of their fighters were wounded in an attack by Azerbaijani forces.
Azerbaijani forces attacked the Armenian fighters on Friday night, “three of them were injured in the shooting that followed,” according to the region’s Defense Ministry.
The fighting in Nargorny-Karabakh, which has claimed thousands of lives in both camps, came to a halt after the signing of a Moscow-sponsored cessation of hostilities agreement in November.
A 2,000-man Russian peacekeeping force has also been deployed to the region to ensure the ceasefire agreement is respected.
