The Nagorno Karabakh Republic’s Defense Ministry issued a press statement today regarding the escalation of tensions on the Karabakh-Azerbaijan Line of Contact. “Azerbaijan’s defense ministry continues to conceal its losses with the objective of keeping its own public in confusion and its adopted and unsuccessful criminal tactics,” the statement read.
“Yesterday, on September 28, according to a press release by Azerbaijan’s Defense Ministry, as a result of clashes along the Karabakh-Azerbaijan Line of Contact, the Azerbaijani side suffered three casualties and the Armenian side lost seven. As we have already communicated, not only does this not correspond to reality, furthermore according to its custom, official Baku is trying to attribute its own casualties to the Karabakh side,” the release stated.
The NKR Defense Ministry went on to say that according to data collected by relevant units of the Defense Army, aside from the previously mentioned casualties, the Azerbaijani side lost an additional six soldiers on September 28.
“Despite the number of casualties, the adversary continued to intensively violate the ceasefire regime on the evening of September 28 and early morning hours of September 29,” the statement read. In that time period, the Azerbaijani side reportedly violated the ceasefire regime around 110 times, using different caliber artillery; more than 1600 shots were aimed at Armenian frontier units by Azerbaijani forces.
The statement concludes: “The units of the Defense Army are realizing all military issues before them and when necessary, undertaking punitive operations.”
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On the evening of September 24, as a result of heavy shelling by the Azerbaijani side, one Armenian civilian was killed in the village of Paravakar and two in the village of Berdavan in the Tavush region; another two civilians were injured.
Armenia’s Defense Ministry issued a statement at the time about the tense situation saying that Armenian military forces will take “necessary measures to stabilize the situation, the consequences of which will be on the shoulders of Azerbaijani leadership.
On September 25, four young soldiers of the Nagorno Karabakh Defense Army were killed near the northeastern section of the Karabakh-Azerbaijan Line of Contact, another 16 were injured. According to a statement by the NKR Defense Ministry, Azerbaijani armed forces opened fire on Armenian frontline positions using Turkish-manufactured rocket propelled howitzers.
That same day, Armenia’s Foreign Affairs Minister Edward Nalbandyan met with his Azerbaijani counterpart Elmar Mammadyarov in New York in the presence of the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs Ambassadors Igor Popov of the Russian Federation, James Warlick of the United States of America, and Pierre Andrieu of France and the Personal Representative of the OSCE Chairman-in-Office Ambassador Andrzej Kasprzyk.