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A ceasefire regime backed by foreign mediators to end clashes that broke out three weeks ago and claimed hundreds of lives was due to take effect at midnight Sunday, but the two sides immediately accused each other of violating the agreement.
The Nagorno-Karabakh region, which formally belongs to Azerbaijan, is controlled by ethnic Armenians backed by Yerevan who declared their independence after the collapse of the Soviet Union.
However, this movement is not recognized by any other state, not even Armenia, and Baku has never hidden its desire to regain control of the territories.
Azerbaijan’s Defense Ministry said Monday that Armenian armed forces fired on four districts of the country at night.
At the time, the Nagorno-Karabakh authorities claimed that Azerbaijani artillery fire continued into the night and that the local army had responded with “proportionate action”.
But the night in Stepanakert, Karabakh’s main city, was quiet at night, an AFP news agency reported.
The latest ceasefire was the second attempt to end the fighting after the collapse of the ceasefire regime agreed to earlier this month in Moscow.
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has accused the Armenian forces of “seriously” violating the ceasefire, including demolishing residential areas. He added that people were killed or injured during those attacks.
Aliyev reported on Twitter that Azerbaijani forces had occupied 13 other Armenian-controlled settlements.
Azerbaijan claims to have achieved a series of victories, having regained territory in recent clashes both in Nagorno-Karabakh and in other parts of Azerbaijan occupied by Armenian forces.
However, analysts believe that it is unlikely that Azerbaijan will be able to take control of the entire disputed region by military means alone, and the seemingly incompatible positions of both sides mean that a diplomatic solution would be extremely difficult to achieve.
UN chief Antonio Guterres called on Armenia and Azerbaijan to “fully comply” with the new ceasefire on Sunday, a spokesman said.
The new agreement was announced after one of the most brutal attacks during the renewed conflict on Saturday, in which a rocket hit a residential area in Azerbaijan’s second-largest city, Ganje, killing 13 civilians, including several children.
According to official figures, the outbreak of fighting for control of Karabakh on 27 September claimed the lives of more than 700 people, but the actual number of victims could be much higher.
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