Tue 20 October 2020:
A ceasefire in the mountain territory of Nagorno-Karabakh was under severe strain on Tuesday after new clashes between Azeri and ethnic Armenian forces in their deadliest fighting since the 1990s.
The ceasefire, agreed on Saturday, has had little impact on fighting that began on Sept. 27, despite concerns it could spark a wider conflict involving Russia and Turkey and fears over the security of gas and oil pipelines in the South Caucasus.
Officials in Nagorno-Karabakh, a breakaway enclave of Azerbaijan controlled by ethnic Armenians, reported new artillery battles on Tuesday morning and said fighting was particularly intense in southern areas of the conflict zone.
Azerbaijan’s defence ministry also reported fighting in several areas, including disputed territory close to the line of contact that divides the sides.
Several hundred people have been killed in the fighting, which each side blames on the other, and there are fears of a humanitarian crisis.
Azerbaijan, which is a close ally of Turkey, says it has made territorial gains. But Armenia, which has a defence pact with Russia, says it has repulsed Azeri attacks and has the situation under control.
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azeri President Ilham Aliyev both told Russia’s TASS news agency in separate interviews on Monday they were ready to come to Moscow for talks.
But the new ceasefire appears to have had little or no more effect that an earlier deal brokered by Russia that failed to halt the fighting.
Nagorno-Karabakh said on Monday 729 of its military personnel and 37 civilians had been killed in the fighting.
Azerbaijan said 61 Azeri civilians had been killed and 282 wounded. It has not disclosed its military casualties.
Upper Karabakh conflict
Relations between the two former Soviet republics have been tense since 1991, when the Armenian military occupied Upper Karabakh, an internationally recognized territory of Azerbaijan.
Fresh clashes erupted on Sept. 27, and Armenia has since continued its attacks on civilians and Azerbaijani forces, even violating humanitarian cease-fire agreements.
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.
Turkey has supported Baku’s right to self-defense, and demanded a withdrawal of the occupying forces.
