No imminent threat of large-scale war in Karabakh conflict - Armenian minister of defense

“The Armenian military is prepared for any development, but I see no threat of a large-scale war,” Ohanyan told Bloomberg. 

On Thursday March 19 at 08:30 local time an Azerbaijani special forces squad attacked Karabakh positions deployed in the northern direction (Gulistan). After nearly two-hour battle Karabakh troops made the Azeri squad run away. Then they pursued and completely destroyed it on the outskirts of the enemy positions. Three Karabakh army of defense soldiers were killed and another four were wounded, two of them in critical but stable condition in hospital now. 

The press office of Karabakh ministry of defense got confirmed yesterday information on at least two Azerbaijani military killed and one wounded. 

The enemy left various arms and ammunition on the field of battle, including AK gun machine with Israeli-made night sight and suppressor, special pioneer equipment, four Mukha grenade launchers, and etc. 

Armenia’s defense minister said regular Azeri raid attempts are of no sense in military terms and are followed, as usual, by disinformation about actual casualties. The situation at the line of contact is under control, the Armenian minister said. 

The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict erupted into armed clashes after the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s as the predominantly Armenian-populated enclave of Azerbaijan sought to secede from Azerbaijan and declared its independence backed by succeeding referendum. A truce was brokered by Russia in 1994, although no permanent peace agreement has been signed. 

Since then, Nagorno-Karabakh and several adjacent regions have been under the control of Armenian forces of Karabakh. Nagorno-Karabakh is the longest-running post-Soviet era conflict and has continued to simmer despite the relative peace of the past two decades, with snipers causing tens of deaths a year. –0--