Mon 12 October 2020:
Dubbing the recent attack a “war crime,” Aliyev said it is also a “gross violation” of the Geneva Conventions
The Russian-brokered ceasefire, clinched after 10 hours of talks in Moscow, was meant to halt fighting to allow ethnic Armenian forces in Nagorno-Karabakh and Azeri forces to swap prisoners and war dead under the mediation of the Red Cross.
The talks were the first diplomatic contact between the two since fighting over the mountainous enclave erupted on September 27, leaving hundreds of people dead. Nagorno-Karabakh is internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan, but is populated and governed by ethnic Armenians.
Earlier on Sunday, Azerbaijan accused Armenia of heavily shelling a residential area in Ganja, its second-largest city, in the early hours of the morning, and of hitting an apartment building.
The Azeri Prosecutor General’s Office said nine people had been killed and 34 wounded in the attack. Reuters could not independently verify Azeri assertions about the number of deaths or injuries.
A Reuters photographer in Ganja saw rescue workers carrying one dead person from the ruins of the apartment building on Sunday morning. The structure had been almost levelled. An excavator was clearing the debris.
Buildings and cars in the immediate vicinity had also been severely damaged.
Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu asked his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov, in a phone call on Sunday to press Armenia to abide by the terms of the truce, Turkey’s foreign ministry said.
Armenia’s foreign minister was due in Moscow on Monday for talks with officials from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe’s (OSCE) Minsk group led by France, Russia and the United States.
Befitting retaliation
Azerbaijan vowed Sunday a “befitting retaliation” against Armenian attacks which targeted Azerbaijani settlements despite a humanitarian cease-fire in place.
“The Armenian side aims to recapture the liberated territories. Armenia’s political-military leadership bears a responsibility for perpetrated crimes. The Azerbaijani side will give a befitting retaliation!” President Ilham Aliyev said on Twitter.
His remarks came right after an Armenian missile attack on Azerbaijan’s second largest city of Ganja, violating a temporary cease-fire on humanitarian grounds
Dubbing the recent attack a “war crime,” Aliyev said it is also a “gross violation” of the Geneva Conventions.
“It is a disrespect to the negotiations under Russia’s mediation and another embodiment of Armenian fascism. These heinous actions can never break the will of the Azerbaijani people!” he pledged.
Upper Karabakh conflict
Relations between the two former Soviet republics have been tense since 1991 when the Armenian military occupied Upper Karabakh.
The fresh clashes began when Armenian forces targeted civilian Azerbaijani settlements and military positions in the region, leading to casualties.
Many world powers, including Russia, France, and the US, have urged a new cease-fire. Turkey, meanwhile, has supported Baku’s right to self-defense and demanded the withdrawal of Armenia’s occupying forces.
Four UN Security Council and two UN General Assembly resolutions, as well as many international organizations, demand the withdrawal of the occupying forces.
The OSCE Minsk Group — co-chaired by France, Russia, and the US — was formed in 1992 to find a peaceful solution to the conflict, but to no avail. A cease-fire, however, was agreed to in 1994.
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