Fighting in the Caucasus: Ivan Kovagan, a senior commander of the Russian peacekeeping force in Nagorno-Karabagan, was killed by gunfire at the convoy he was traveling in after the signing of the ceasefire agreement between the Armenian autonomous forces and the Azerbaijani army.
Kovagan, a submarine officer in the Russian Navy, was killed by Azerbaijani army fire along with seven other Russian soldiers. There was no official announcement from Moscow about the incident, but independent media outlets in the Caucasus countries, especially Armenia, leaked about the incident.
Russian peacekeepers in Nagorno-Karabakh evacuate civilians
Covagan's photo was posted on social media and Russian military bloggers confirmed his death. Azerbaijan officially apologized for the incident and announced that members of the force that carried out the shooting would be suspended from their positions as part of an investigation into the affair. A few hours earlier, an outpost of the Russian peacekeeping force was bombed by the Azeri army, but no one was hurt as the post was evacuated.
The heads of the Armenian self-government in Nagorno-Karabakh announced that they had held a preliminary meeting today with representatives of the regime in Baku on the integration of the region into the Azeri state and expressed some optimism about the continued progress of the talks. The talks focused on transferring weapons held by Armenian separatists to the Azeri army. Armenian representatives asked for guarantees for the safety of the civilian population in the Armenian enclave in return for the handing over of weapons held by the militiamen.
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