Azerbaijan

Azerbaijan proposes bringing forward Armenia talks to October because of tension

cde.news desk 3 October 2022, 09:00 · 1 min read

Azeri people gather for mass funerals of Azeri servicemen who were killed during clashes with Armenian troops on the border with Armenia, at the cemetery near Baku, Azerbaijan, 14 September 2022. Armenia and Azerbaijan exchanged artillery fire on the night to 13 September, prompting fears of escalation, with both sides blaming each other for the initial provocations. According to the Armenian side, from midnight, Azerbaijan began to conduct intense fire in the direction of the settlements of Sotka, Goris and Jermuk in the southeast of the country from artillery pieces and large-caliber weapons. According to the Armenian Defense Ministry, at least 105 people from the Armenian side died as a result of the conflict. Baku and Yerevan, through the mediation of Moscow, were able to agree on a ceasefire from 09:00 Moscow time, the Russian Foreign Ministry reported. The Azerbaijani Defense Ministry reported that the reason for the aggravation was 'intensive shelling over the past month of the positions of the Azerbaijani army in the Kalbajar, Lachin, Dashkesan and Gedabek directions and large-scale provocations committed today,' and placed all responsibility for what happened on the military leadership of Armenia. According to the information by the Azerbaijan Defence ministry, 50 Azeri servicemen have been killed in last two days. EPA-EFE/ROMAN ISMAYILOV

(Reuters) – Azerbaijan’s foreign ministry said late on Sunday that it proposed bringing forward scheduled talks with Armenia to October from November to address tensions on their border.

On Sunday, the foreign ministers from Azerbaijan and Armenia met in Geneva, after the worst fighting between the two ex-Soviet countries since 2020 killed more than 200 in late September.

“During the meeting, Azerbaijan proposed to hold the next meeting of the bilateral commission on delimitation in October, not in November, as previously agreed, taking into account the tension on the non-delimited border,” the ministry said in a statement on its website.

The fighting is linked to decades-old hostilities over control of the Nagorno-Karabakh region, internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan but until 2020 largely controlled by the majority ethnic Armenian population.

Reporting in Melbourne by Lidia Kelly; Editing by Robert Birsel

Reuters

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