Four Karabakh Armenian soldiers were killed and one Azerbaijani soldier was injured during violence overnight on Tuesday to Wednesday (27 and 28 June).
Just before 9pm on Tuesday evening, the Azerbaijani Ministry of Defense released a statement claiming that "illegal Armenian armed detachments in the territory of Azerbaijan" opened fire on Azerbaijani positions near the settlement of Galaychilar, wounding one soldier who has been named as Ali Bakirov. The Azerbaijani MoD said that they took "retaliatory measures".
De facto authorities in Nagorno-Karabakh quickly denied the initial Azerbaijani allegation, however, accusing Baku of using "false" claims as an "information basis" for overnight shelling around Martakert and Martuni in which four Karabakh Armenian soldiers were killed. The dead have been named as Armo Abgaryan, Samvel Torosyan, Yervand Tadevosyan, and Gagik Balayan.
Tensions along the Nagorno-Karabakh "line of contact" and the Armenian-Azerbaijani border have increased significantly over the past month, with the conflicting sides accusing each other of violating the ceasefire on a virtually daily basis.
source: commonspace.eu with agencies
photo: RFE/RL