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More Armenian-Azeri Skirmishes Reported

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  • More Armenian-Azeri Skirmishes Reported

    MORE ARMENIAN-AZERI SKIRMISHES REPORTED
    By Emil Danielyan

    Radio Liberty. Czech Rep.
    March 30 2006

    Armenia and Azerbaijan have reported fresh exchanges of fire between
    their forces which have disrupted a regular international monitoring
    of ceasefire around Nagorno-Karabakh and killed at least one soldier.

    The Baku-based ANS television said on Thursday that an Azerbaijani
    serviceman was shot dead in the westernmost section of the heavily
    militarized Armenian-Azerbaijani frontier. The Azerbaijani Defense
    Ministry confirmed the report, alleging an Armenian truce violation.

    There was no immediate comment from the Armenian side.

    The incident was reported from an area that has seen an upsurge in
    cross-border skirmishes this month. Both conflicting parties have
    reported casualties among their troops, blaming each other for the
    fighting that followed the collapse of a crucial Armenian-Azerbaijani
    summit held in France on February 10-11.

    Tension has also risen along the main Armenian-Azerbaijani line of
    contact east of Nagorno-Karabakh. The latest Azerbaijani casualty
    was reported the day after a disruption of ceasefire monitoring
    by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe in the
    northeastern section of the Karabakh frontline.

    The Armenian Defense Ministry said on Wednesday that OSCE field
    observers accompanied by Karabakh officials came under Azerbaijani
    gunfire as they were about to carry out what has become a routine
    procedure. "Due to a lack of security guarantees from the Azerbaijani
    side, Ambassador Andrzej Kasprzyk postponed the monitoring," the
    ministry spokesman, Colonel Seyran Shahsuvarian, told RFE/RL, referring
    to the longtime head of the OSCE military mission in the conflict zone.

    The Azerbaijani side claimed the opposite, however. The Interfax
    news agency quoted an Azerbaijani military spokesman as saying that
    Kasprzyk "heard shots fired from the Armenian section of the border
    and ordered that monitoring be cancelled." The OSCE official has not
    yet commented on the conflicting statements from Baku and Yerevan.

    Meanwhile, Azerbaijan's dovish Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov was
    quoted by ANS as saying that the latest fighting only demonstrates
    that the Karabakh conflict is far from being frozen. "Azerbaijani and
    Armenian soldiers are killed every week," Mammadyarov said, adding
    that the conflict should therefore be resolved "as soon as possible."
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