Tbilisi (Reuters) – Russian President Vladimir Putin tried on Tuesday to end fighting between Armenia and Azerbaijan after at least 49 Armenian soldiers were killed in border clashes that raised fears of another war in the former Soviet Union. .
Russia, the United States and France have called for restraint after the bloodiest fighting since the six-week war between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region broke out in 2020.
Armenia said several cities near the Azerbaijani border, including Jermuk, Goris and Kaban, were bombed in the early hours of Tuesday, explaining that it had responded to what it described as a “large-scale provocation” of Azerbaijan.
Baku said it was attacked by Armenia. Reuters was not immediately able to verify battlefield reports from each side.
“The role of the Russian Federation and Putin personally cannot be ignored,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.
“It is natural for the president to do everything in his power to help ease tensions at the border,” he added.
Russia, which sent troops to Ukraine in February’s largest European land invasion since World War II, is the leading power in the Caucasus and an ally of Armenia through the Russian-led Collective Security Treaty Organization, which met on Tuesday to discuss the situation.
Russia sent thousands of peacekeepers to the region in 2020 as part of a deal to end a war that saw Azerbaijan gain major territorial gains in and around Nagorno-Karabakh.
Turkey supports Azerbaijan politically and militarily.
* Cross-border struggle
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan accused Azerbaijan of attacking Armenian cities because he does not want to negotiate the status of Nagorno-Karabakh, an enclave within Azerbaijan inhabited mainly by ethnic Armenians.
“The intensity of hostilities has decreased, but attacks on one or two fronts from Azerbaijan continue,” Russian media quoted Pashinyan in a speech to his country’s parliament.
Azerbaijan, which accused Armenia of carrying out intelligence activities along the border and moving weapons, said its military positions were attacked by Armenia. He added that he had suffered casualties, but did not disclose the number of deaths and injuries among his forces.
Azerbaijani media reported that the ceasefire agreement was violated almost immediately after it was implemented early Tuesday.
* A call to calm
Russia and the United States, at loggerheads over the war in Ukraine, have asked Baku and Yerevan to exercise restraint.
“As we have long ago made clear, there can be no military solution to the conflict,” US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said in a statement. We demand an immediate end to any hostile military action ”.
The Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement that the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan “must be resolved exclusively by political and diplomatic means”.
Defense ministers of Armenia and Russia intervened on Tuesday morning and agreed to take steps to achieve stability at the border, while Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu called his Azerbaijani counterpart Jehon Peramov and called on Armenia to “stop his provocations “.
European Council President Charles Michel also urged Pashinyan to prevent further escalation. Michel met Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev in Brussels last month for talks on normalizing relations between the two countries, humanitarian issues and a possible peace treaty on Nagorno-Karabakh.
France will bring clashes between Armenia and Azerbaijan to the UN Security Council, French President Emmanuel Macron’s office said, adding that Macron continued to urge both sides to join the ceasefire.
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