Nagorno-Karabakh again under Azerbaijani bombs. The capital of the separatist region, Stepanakert, and other towns in the region are being targeted by "intensive fire", local authorities said on Tuesday. "Azerbaijan has launched a large-scale military operation against the Republic of Artsakh (the name given by Armenians to Nagorno-Karabakh, editor's note)," the separatists' representation in Armenia said on Facebook.
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Azerbaijan, for its part, announced that it had launched "anti-terrorist operations" targeting Armenian forces in the region disputed by Armenians and Azerbaijanis and where detonations were heard by a journalist in Stepanakert. This announcement comes three years after the start of the previous Karabakh war in September 2020, a conflict won at the time after six weeks by Azerbaijani forces. "Anti-terrorist operations have begun in the region. As part of these measures, the positions of the Armenian armed forces ... are put out of harm's way with the use of high-precision weapons on the front line and in depth," the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry said in a statement.
No Armenian army soldiers on the ground, Yerevan says
Armenia said it had no armed forces deployed, implying that only its separatist allies were on the ground to deal with the Baku offensive. "Azerbaijan has opened fire on various military positions in Karabakh," Armenian MP Tigran Abrahamian said on Facebook.
Azerbaijan said it had informed Russia and Turkey of its operation in Karabakh. Baku justified its military operation by the death of four policemen and two civilians in the explosion of mines on a road construction site in Nagorno-Karabakh, accusing Armenian separatists in this disputed region of having committed these acts of "terrorism".
Nagorno-Karabakh, scene of two wars between Armenia and Azerbaijan, in the early 1990s and autumn 2020, is one of the most mined regions of the former USSR. Explosions regularly cause casualties. This mountainous region with an Armenian majority located in Azerbaijan proclaimed its independence from Baku to the disintegration of the USSR, with the support of Yerevan, leading to an armed conflict won by the separatists.
Fragile truce
But 30 years later, in the fall of 2020, the Azerbaijani armed forces took their revenge and recaptured significant territories in and around the region. This war ended after Vladimir Putin mediated and the deployment of a Russian peacekeeping mission. But the truce has always been fragile and punctuated by armed incidents.
These new incidents come as Yerevan accuses Baku, which denies, of causing a humanitarian crisis in Nagorno-Karabakh by blocking since the end of 2022 the Lachin corridor, the only road between Armenia and the mountainous enclave. Armenia also blames Russia for its inaction. Baku, with Turkey's support and oil windfall, has built an army far more powerful than that of its Armenian neighbor.