Russia 'hopeful' July clashes along Armenian-Azerbaijani border 'will not be repeated'

18:04 • 26.08.20

Politics

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has expressed hope that clashes repeating the scenario of the July escalations along Armenia's north-eastern border with Azerbaijan will not have their continuation in the future.

Summing up his negotiations with Jeyhun Bayramov, Azerbaijan's newly appointed foreign minister in Moscow, the Russian top diplomat also called for abidance by "internationally acceptable decisions" in settling the long-running Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh) conflict. Lavrov cited the frameworks elaborated by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) as a serious basis for future negotiations.

"More intensive negotiations would not, of course, be unnecessary, but to realize those programs, it is first of all important to settle the general situation by ruling out incidents among other things. We do have great hopes that what happened in July will not be repeated," TASS.ru quotes him as saying.

Lavrov also emphasized the OSCE Minsk Group mission's plan to visit Baku and Yerevan in the near future and to arrange a summit on the level of the two countries' foreign ministers.

Azerbaijani combat troops launched series of attacks against north-eastern Armenian military outposts on July 12. In the early morning hours, the Ministry of Defense reported an incursion attempt by several Azerbaijani servicemen who wanted to cross into the Tavush region in a jeep car. After a warning by the Armenian side, they returned to the starting positions, leaving the vehicle on Armenia's territory.

The adversary repeated the border transgression attempt about an hour later, opening fire in the same direction but was subsequently suppressed and pushed back with losses

Azerbaijan kept the north-eastern outposts under fire also on July 13 and 14. The tensions gradually abated the following days. Four Armenian servicemen were killed in the wake of the cross-border violence. Azerbaijan's military reported 11 losses.

The Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh broke out in 1988 when the Armenian majority of the then autonomous region declared its intention to break away from Azerbaijan. In a referendum held on December 10, 1991 (days before the collapse of the USSR), the population voted overwhelmingly in favor of independence (99.89%). The move was followed by Azerbaijan’s large-scale military operations against Nagorno-Karabakh and seven neighboring regions. The armed violence left around 25,000-30,000 people dead; thousands were internally displaced. The Ceasefire Accord, which went into effect in May 1994, formally put an end to the armed attacks in the conflict zone, but sporadic fighting in the area breaks out time and again. Since 1994, the OSCE Minsk Group, a mission co-chaired by France, the United States and Russia, has been spearheading the efforts towards a peaceful solution to the conflict.

The hostilities escalated to an unprecedented degree in April 2016 in what was later dubbed a Four-Day War. In the early hours of April 1, 2016, Azerbaijan's armed forces launched heavy offensives along the Line of Contact, provoking large-scale confrontations with the Defense Army of Nagorno-Kkarabakh. The adversary also shelled civilian settlements, particularly the southern and north-eastern regions of Hadrut and Marakert.

A ceasefire was reached on 5 April between the chiefs of the armed forces of Azerbaijan and Armenia in Moscow. The Nagorno-Karabakh authorities also welcomed the verbal agreement.

Armenian News - Tert.am