Armenia shells Azerbaijani positions in Kalbajar

By Azernews

By Vugar Khalilov

The Azerbaijani army positions have come under Armenian fire in Kalbajar region near the border with Armenia, the Defence Ministry reported on February 23.

In a statement posted on its website, the ministry said: “At 0355 on February 23, the Armenian armed forces units from the positions in Yukhari Shorzha settlement of Basarkechar region, with no reason, using small arms subjected to fire the Azerbaijan army positions in Zeylik settlement of Kalbajar region”.

The Azerbaijani army units took adequate retaliatory measures to suppress the opposite side.

It was earlier reported that the Armenian armed forces shelled Azerbaijan's military positions in the same direction on February 10-11.

The trilateral ceasefire deal signed by the Azerbaijani, Russian and Armenian leaders on November 10, 2020, ended the three-decade conflict over Azerbaijan’s Karabakh region which along with the seven adjacent regions came under the occupation of Armenian armed forces in the war in the early 1990s.

On January 11, 2021, the Azerbaijani, Russian and Armenian leaders signed the second statement since the end of the 44-day war. The newly-signed statement was set to implement clause 9 of the November 2020 statement related to the unblocking of all economic and transport communications in the region.

On November 26, 2021, the Azerbaijani, Russian and Armenian leaders signed a statement and agreed on a number of issues, including the demarcation and delimitation of the Azerbaijani-Armenian border by late 2021, some points related to humanitarian issues and the issue of unblocking of transport corridors which applies to the railway and to automobile communications.

On December 14, 2021, during the Brussels meeting, organized between Azerbaijani and Armenian leaders at the initiative of European Council President Charles Michel, the sides reaffirmed their commitment to the conditions agreed in the Sochi meeting.

Both sides agreed to establish a temporary working group on the delimitation of the Armenian-Azerbaijani border.

The issue of demining the liberated territories of Azerbaijan was also brought up on the agenda, and the European Union's readiness to provide technical assistance to Azerbaijan in this regard was underlined at the meeting.