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Iran warned on Saturday of any “intrusion” into its territory by Armenian and Azerbaijani forces involved in fighting in Nagorno-Karabakh, after mortar fire hit Iranian villages along the border, reports AFP, according to Agerpres.
“Any intrusion into the territory of our country by one or other of the parties to the conflict is intolerable and we seriously warn all parties to take the necessary precautions in this regard,” said a statement from the Iranian Foreign Ministry on its website. Web. official.
The Nagorno-Karabakh enclave, inhabited by a majority of ethnic Armenians, separated from Azerbaijan, provoking a war with 30,000 dead in the early 1990s. The conflict has been frozen since then, despite frequent clashes, like those that resumed a week ago between Baku and Yerevan.
Several mortar shells landed in Iranian villages across the Nagorno-Karabakh border on Monday, according to the official Irna news agency.
A six-year-old boy was injured on Wednesday after five shells struck the village of Parviz Khanlou in eastern Azerbaijan, damaging farms and residential buildings.
According to Irna, the deputy governor of Ardabil, Behrouz Nedai, urged the locals to stay away from the conflict zone “given the intensity of the fighting.”
Many Iranians living along the border in Ardabil province “witness daily exchanges of gunfire between Baku and Yerevan,” Irna said.
The Islamic Republic has an Azerbaijani-speaking community of about 10 million people, as well as an Armenian community of about 100,000 people.
In a statement issued on Saturday, Tehran renewed its call for the belligerents to end the fighting, saying it was ready to help Armenia and Azerbaijan start peace talks.
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