Despite a ceasefire, fighting intensifies between Armenia and Azerbaijan
On Monday, Armenian and Azerbaijani defense ministries accused each other of violating the ceasefire agreed upon on Saturday morning in Moscow.
The Kremlin-brokered deal, which took over 10 hours of negotiation to finalize, was meant to bring a sustainable end to the humanitarian crisis and allow the sides to swap hostages and fallen troops over the last two weeks.
Each side accused the other of mounting new attacks.
At least ten were killed and dozens injured after missle strike hit an apartment building in Ganja, Azerbaijan’s second-largest city. The attack took place a day after the ceasefire had gone into effect. In retaliation, the Azerbaijani forces reportedly shelled the administrative center of Nagorno-Karabakh, also known as Artsakh, Khankendi (Stepanakert). Later, the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry said another densely populated town under Azerbaijani control, Tartar, was attacked.
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev claimed in an interview with Turkish Haber Global TV channel that the attack on Ganja was specifically ordered by Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan.
“The military-political leadership of Armenia stands behind the missile strike on Ganja. We have information that the decision was made by Pashinyan himself,” Aliyev was quoted as saying on Monday.
“Armenia is losing, therefore it wants to take its grief and pain from the civil population,” he said.
Moscow, which monitors the developments, said the ceasefire agreement reached in Moscow on Friday had not been fully implemented.
“We see the agreement is not yet fully implemented and military operations continue. We hope our contacts with [Armenia] and our Azerbaijani counterparts will ensure the full implementation of the tripartite agreements,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov was cited as saying in a meeting with his Armenian counterpart Zohrab Mnatsakanyan.
Accusing Azerbaijan of ceasefire violations, Mnatsakanyan said Baku “is not faithful to the ceasefire.” He also accused Azerbaijan of involving Turkey in the region and of deploying Turkish-backed Syrian mercenaries in Nagorno-Karabakh. These allegations have repeatedly been denied by Ankara and Baku.