Azerbaijan demands enclave’s surrender – DW – 09/19/2023

Russia’s Defense Ministry on Tuesday said its peacekeeping forces had begun evacuating civilians from the breakaway ethnic-Armenian enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh.

“During the day, 469 people, including 185 children, were evacuated to the location of the Russian peacekeeping contingent,” according to a Defense Ministry statement. The statement also said troops provided medical assistance to several wounded civilians, including children. 

The 2,000-member Russian peacekeeping corps was deployed to the region by Moscow to monitor a 2020 ceasefire between Azerbaijan and Armenia, after a short conflict marked by considerable gains for Baku.

The separatist authorities in the region also said on Tuesday that six villages had been evacuated.

In official statements, authorities in Azerbaijan said they were willing to end operations and initiate talks — but only if separatists laid down their arms.

The government in Baku also demanded the complete dissolution of the breakaway region’s de facto administration.

“Nevertheless, for the antiterror measures to stop, the illegal Armenian military formations must raise the white flag, all the weapons must be handed over, and the illegal regime must be dissolved,” read a statement. “Otherwise, the antiterror measures will be continued until the end.”

Azerbaijan also claimed it would protect the ethnic-Armenian residents of Nagorno-Karabakh after assaulting the breakaway region and demanding separatist forces withdraw.

“The rights and security of civilians of Armenian descent in the Karabakh region of Azerbaijan will be provided under the Constitution and international obligations of Azerbaijan,” Presidential Foreign Policy Advisor Hikmet Hajiyev wrote on social media, also saying that Armenian forces must “dissolve and disarm!”

Germany’s Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock accused Azerbaijan of going back on its word by launching military action in the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region, “Baku’s promise to refrain from military action was broken.” 

Speaking from the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York, Baerbock urged, “Azerbaijan must immediately stop shelling and return to the negotiating table.”

“The crucial thing is to protect the civilian population in Nagorno-Karabakh,” the diplomat said. “This is also the task of Russian soldiers stationed there.”

Russian troops stationed in the region were deployed to monitor the ceasefire Azerbaijan and Armenia agreed to in 2020, in the wake of a six-day war. Azerbaijan’s ally Turkey was also monitoring the fragile peace.

Baerbock said Berlin supported peace talks as the only path forward, claiming, “In view of today’s escalation, these are more urgent than ever.”

The separatists leadership of the ethnic Armenian-populated region of Nagorno Karabakh on Tuesday suggested a cease-fire.

The authority’s press office said in a statement it was proposing talks with Baku, following Azerbaijan’s so-called “anti-terrorist” operations in the breakaway region, announced just a few hours earlier. 

France has urged the United Nations Security Council to immediately convene following Baku’s operations.

The French Foreign Ministry said in a statement that no pretext could justify the military operation Azerbaijan launched in Nagorno-Karabakh.

France said the outbreak of fighting “threatens thousands of civilians already affected by a months-long illegal blockade and which runs against efforts by the international community to reach a negotiated settlement.”

Paris said it was working with its partners to prepare a “strong response” to what Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna called an “illegal, unjustifiable and unacceptable” operation.

“I would like to emphasize that we hold Azerbaijan responsible for the fate of Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh,” she said.

Five people were killed and 80 injured in attacks by the Azerbaijani military following what it called “anti-terrorist” operations in the breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region, a separatist official in the region said. Fifteen of the injured were civilians.

Gegham Stepanyan, the separatist human rights ombudsman in the ethnic Armenian-controlled Azerbaijani enclave, said that eight of those wounded were children.

Armenia has accused Azerbaijan of launching a “ground operation” in the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region, yet Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said that his army was not involved in the fighting.

“Azerbaijan has begun a ground operation aimed at ethnic cleaning of Karabakh Armenians,” Pashinyan said in a TV address. 

He added that Armenia does not have an army in the region.

“For the moment, the situation is stable along Armenia’s entire border [with Azerbaijan].”

Russia said on Tuesday it was only given notice of Azerbaijan’s operation “minutes” before its launch, denying it was told in advance.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said in statements that media reports suggesting Azerbaijan warned the Russian peacekeepers stationed in the region in advance “does not correspond to reality.”

“The information was communicated to the Russian contingent a few minutes before the outbreak of hostilities,” Zakharova said.

Armenian separatists in the breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region have said Azerbaijani forces were trying to advance into the region.

“The Azerbaijani Armed Forces are trying to advance into Artsakh,” it said, using an Armenian name for the area. “The Defense Forces continue to resist Azerbaijan’s offensive along the entire line of contact.” 

The European Union has called on Azerbaijan to “immediately” halt its military actions in Nagorno-Karabakh, after Baku said it launched “anti-terrorist” operations.

“Devastating news coming from former Nagorno-Karabakh oblast today,” European Council President Charles Michel said on social media.

He called for allowing a “genuine dialogue between Baku and Karabakh Armenians.”

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell also said the bloc “condemns the military escalation” and “deplores the loss of lives.”

“This military escalation should not be used as a pretext to force the exodus of the local population,” Borrell said. “Violence needs to stop in order to provide a conducive environment for peace and normalization talks.”
 

Armenia has accused Azerbaijan of launching “large-scale aggression” against the Nagorno-Karabakh region, claiming Baku was attempting “ethnic cleansing” in the region, which has a large ethnic Armenian population.

“On September 19, Azerbaijan unleashed another large-scale [act of] aggression against the people of Nagorno-Karabakh, aiming to complete its policy of ethnic cleansing,” Armenia’s Foreign Ministry said.

Azerbaijan has said that it is opening humanitarian routes for civilians as it proceeded with what it called “anti-terrorist” operations in the breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region. 

“To ensure the evacuation of the population from the risk zone, humanitarian corridors and reception points have been established on the Lachin road and in other directions,” the Defense Ministry said in a statement.

The Lachin corridor connects the enclave to Armenia.

Nagorno-Karabakh had been cut off from much-needed aid since December, when Azerbaijan closed the one road connecting the region to Armenia. The International Committee of the Red Cross was finally able to send trucks full of food and medicine to the region on Monday, a day before Azerbaijan’s military action.

Armenia has urged Russian peacekeeping troops in the breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region to intervene and stop Baku’s “full-scale aggression,” the Armenian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

Russian troops have been stationed in the disputed region since the end of the 2020 war. However, Armenia has said that Russia’s war in Ukraine has distracted Moscow since it began.

Azerbaijan demanded on Tuesday the “complete withdrawal” of Armenian forces from the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region, saying it was the condition for peace after launching its “anti-terrorist operations.”

“The only way to achieve peace and stability in the region is the unconditional and complete withdrawal of the Armenian armed forces from the Karabakh region of Azerbaijan and the dissolution of the so-called [Armenian separatist] regime,” Azerbaijan’s Defense Ministry said in a statement. 

Armenia’s Defense Ministry had said no personnel or equipment was present in the breakaway region.

Azerbaijan has briefed its Turkish ally regarding what it has called “anti-terrorist” operations in the breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region.

Azerbaijan’s Defense Minister Zakir Gasanov spoke to his Turkish counterpart Yasar Guler regarding the operations, the ministry announced in a statement.