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STEPANAKERT: Armenia and Azerbaijan vowed to keep fighting and rejected international calls for negotiations on Wednesday as clashes over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region raged for a fourth day.
In Stepanakert, the capital of the separatist province, two explosions were heard around midnight as sirens sounded. Residents said the city had been attacked by drones.
The streets were dark with public lighting turned off, although some shops were open in the city, which according to local authorities were attacked when violence broke out on Sunday.
Moscow said Russian President Vladimir Putin and his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron had called for a “complete” halt to the fighting in Karabakh and said they were willing to step up diplomatic efforts to help resolve the conflict.
“Vladimir Putin and Emmanuel Macron called on the conflicting parties to stop the fire completely and as soon as possible, to reduce tensions and show maximum restraint,” the Kremlin said.
In a phone call, the two leaders expressed their “willingness” to see a statement made on behalf of the co-chairs of the Minsk Group – Russia, France and the United States – calling for an “immediate” end to the fighting and the start of speaking added.
Armenian and Azerbaijani forces are engaged in the heaviest fighting in years over Karabakh, an ethnic Armenian province that separated from Azerbaijan in the 1990s when the Soviet Union collapsed.
The confirmed death toll surpassed 100 people, including civilians, on Wednesday, with both sides claiming to have inflicted heavy losses on the other.
Baku and Yerevan have ignored mounting international pressure for a ceasefire, prompting fears that the conflict will escalate into all-out war and attract regional powers such as Turkey and Russia.
“We need to prepare for a long-term war,” Karabakh separatist leader Arayik Harutyunyan said on Wednesday.
Moscow, which has a military pact with Armenia but also good ties with Azerbaijan, has repeatedly called for an end to the fighting and on Wednesday offered to host negotiations.
Russia ‘ready’ for the meeting
In separate telephone conversations with his counterparts from both former Soviet countries, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov reaffirmed Moscow’s “readiness” to organize a meeting.
But none of the leaders showed signs of being ready for talks.
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev promised that his army would continue to fight until the Armenian troops withdrew completely from Karabakh.
If “the Armenian government complies with the demand, the fighting and bloodshed will end and peace will be established in the region,” he said while visiting the wounded soldiers.
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said it was “not very appropriate” to speak of negotiations “at a time of intense hostilities.”
In Armenia’s capital Yerevan, dozens of men gathered outside a recruiting office to join the fight.
“We must act to defend our homeland against the aggressor,” said Kamo, a 32-year-old factory worker.
“This is our land. We will die before we abandon it. “
There has been no truce in the fighting since the weekend, with both sides reporting new civilian casualties on Wednesday.
Armenia has recorded 104 military deaths and 23 civilian deaths.
Azerbaijan’s Defense Ministry said its forces have killed 2,300 Karabakh separatist soldiers and “destroyed 130 tanks, 200 artillery units, 25 anti-aircraft units, five ammunition depots, 50 anti-tank units, 55 military vehicles.”
Armenia claimed that Azerbaijan had lost 130 soldiers while another 200 were wounded.
“The Armenian armed forces destroyed 29 tanks and armored vehicles,” said a spokesman for the Defense Ministry.
‘Real enemy’
The Karabakh Defense Ministry, for its part, said Azerbaijani forces “continued to bombard with artillery” along the front line.
The two sides have accused each other of targeting civilian areas, including some far from Karabakh.
Yerevan claims that Turkey, a former ally of Azerbaijan, is providing direct military support to Baku.
It said on Tuesday that a Turkish F-16 flying in support of Baku forces had shot down an Armenian SU-25 warplane, but Ankara and Baku denied the claim.
The Karabakh separatist leader reiterated claims that Turkey was involved.
“The real enemy is Turkey,” Harutyunyan said.
There have been reports that Turkey sent fighters from Syria, where Ankara is allied with some rebel groups, to join the Azerbaijani side.
Azerbaijan, for its part, also claimed that Armenia was deploying foreign fighters.
“Mercenaries from Middle Eastern countries are fighting against us together with Armenian forces,” Aliyev’s foreign policy adviser Hikmet Khadjiyev told AFP.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry said “fighters from illegal armed groups, including Syria and Libya,” were being deployed to the conflict zone.
He said he was “deeply concerned” but did not say who was responsible or blame anyone.
‘Close to full-scale war’
“We are definitely very close to seeing a war on a large scale, possibly even on a regional scale,” said Olesya Vartanyan of the International Crisis Group.
Karabakh’s declaration of independence from Azerbaijan triggered a war in the early 1990s that claimed 30,000 lives, but no country yet recognizes it as independent, including Armenia.
Talks to resolve the conflict have largely stalled since the 1994 ceasefire agreement.
