Armenia reports dozens of soldiers killed in fighting with Azerbaijan

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President Pashinyan of Armenia in conversation with an officer (May 2021)

Photo: Tigran Mehrabyan / dpa

In the decades-long conflict over the Nagorno-Karabakh region, new fighting has broken out between Azerbaijan and Armenia.

Both sides blamed each other for the renewed violence on Tuesday.

At least 49 Armenian soldiers were killed in fighting in the border area, according to Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan.

The number of victims will probably increase, Pashinyan said in the parliament in Yerevan.

According to Russian news agencies, Armenia's defense ministry accused Azerbaijan of a "large-scale provocation," to which it responded accordingly.

Azerbaijan's defense ministry claimed several positions of its armed forces were shelled by the Armenian army.

"There are personnel losses and damage to the military infrastructure."

According to his office, in telephone calls with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Russian President Vladimir Putin and French President Emmanuel Macron, Pashinyan called for an "appropriate reaction from the international community" to Azerbaijan's actions.

In a telephone conversation, Armenia's Defense Minister Suren Papikjan and Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu decided to take the "necessary measures to stabilize the situation," the government in Yerevan said.

The Turkish government, in turn, called on Armenia to stop its "provocations" against Azerbaijan and to "concentrate on peace negotiations and cooperation" with Baku.

According to Azerbaijani media, both sides had agreed on a ceasefire in the morning.

However, the agreement was only violated again shortly after it came into force.

The two former Soviet republics have been at odds over the Caucasus region of Nagorno-Karabakh for decades.

Under international law, the area, which is inhabited mostly by Armenians, belongs to Azerbaijan, from which it had renounced in 1991.

The conflict had led to a war in 2020, which ended after six weeks with a Russian-brokered ceasefire.

In April 2022, both countries declared that they wanted to negotiate a peace treaty mediated by the EU during peace talks after the war in Nagorno-Karabakh.

According to Armenians, a commission should also be set up to deal with issues of security and stability along the border.

as/Reuters/AFP/dpa