Fresh fears of fighting in Nagorno-Karabakh as Azerbaijan accuses Armenia of violating ceasefire with machine gun volley

Just months after a Russian-brokered accord paused hostilities in the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh, Azerbaijan has accused Armenia of restarting fighting, sparking concern for the fragile ceasefire.

In a statement issued on Tuesday, Baku’s State Border Service said that “the provocations of the enemy on the frontier with Armenia are continuing.”

Earlier, they alleged, Armenia’s troops “violated the ceasefire by firing 20 machine guns at the border checkpoint.” However, Gevorg Altunyan, the head of the press service for the Defense Ministry in Yerevan, strongly denied the claims in comments to RIA Novosti. “This is an absolute lie,” he said.

On the same day, Armenian officials announced they had launched an appeal to the European Court of Human Rights, insisting that Azerbaijan has violated the rights of the inhabitants of the disputed region.

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“The complaint,” they said, “raises a number of issues, including protecting the rights of prisoners of war and civilians, the resettled population of [Nagorno-Karabakh], wounded citizens and relatives of the victims, people who have lost property, and representatives of local and international media.”

In November, the two sides agreed to a deal mediated by Moscow that saw an effective pause to the fighting. It entailed a package of measures that saw Russian peacekeepers deployed to prevent further escalations, as well as handing over swathes of territory previously held by pro-Armenian authorities to Azerbaijan.

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