Heavy shelling between Armenian and Azerbaijani forces persisted Thursday despite fresh calls from world leaders for an end to days of fighting over the disputed Nagorny Karabakh region.
In the breakaway province's capital
Stepanakert, two explosions were heard’ around midnight as sirens sounded.
Residents said the city had been attacked by drones.
The rival Caucasus nations have been
locked’ in a bitter stalemate over the Karabakh region since the collapse of
the Soviet Union when the ethnic Armenian province broke away from Azerbaijan.
The fiercest clashes between Armenian and
Azerbaijani forces in years over the breakaway region ignited Sunday and
confirmed deaths neared 130 as fighting spilled over into a fifth day.
Azerbaijan's defence ministry said
Thursday its forces had carried out "crushing artillery strikes against
Armenian forces' positions in the occupied territories," throughout the
night.
Separatist officials in Karabakh described
the overnight situation along the frontline as "tense" and said both
sides exchanged artillery fire.
"The enemy attempted to regroup its
troops, but Armenian forces suppressed all such attempts."
The two sides claim to have inflicted
heavy losses on opposing forces and ignored repeated calls from international
leaders to halt fighting that carries the threat of drawing in regional powers
Turkey and Russia.
Yerevan is in a military alliance of
ex-Soviet countries led by Moscow and has accused Turkey of dispatching
mercenaries from northern Syria to bolster Azerbaijan's forces in the Karabakh
conflict.
It also claimed earlier this week that a
Turkish F-16 flying in support of Baku's forces had downed an Armenian SU-25
warplane, but Ankara and Baku denied the claim.
- Calls for ceasefire -
Moscow has repeatedly called for an end to
the fighting and on Wednesday offered to host negotiations.
It also said it was concerned that members
of illegal fighting groups, including from Syria and Libya, were being deployed’
to the fight.
Confirmed deaths have risen to 127
including civilians, with both sides claiming to have inflicted heavy losses on
the other.
Armenia has recorded the deaths of 104
soldiers and 23 civilians.
Azerbaijan has not admitted to any
military casualties, but an AFP journalist in the southern Beylagan region
witnessed the funeral of one soldier killed in the clashes.
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan
and Azerbaijani leader Ilham Aliyev have both rejected the idea of holding
talks even as calls for a halt in the fighting mount.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and his
French counterpart Emmanuel Macron, in a telephone conversation late Wednesday,
issued the most recent call for a complete halt to fighting in Karabakh and
said they were ready to intensify diplomatic efforts to help resolve the
conflict.
Karabakh's declaration of independence
from Azerbaijan sparked a war in the early 1990s that claimed 30,000 lives, but
it is still not recognised’ as independent by any country, including Armenia.
Armenia and Karabakh declared martial law
and military mobilisation Sunday, while Azerbaijan imposed military rule and a
curfew in large cities.
Talks to resolve the conflict have largely
stalled since a 1994 ceasefire agreement.
France, Russia and the United States have
mediated peace efforts as the "Minsk Group", but the last big push
for a peace deal collapsed in 2010.
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