Azerbaijani army ready to thwart any Armenian threats to nation’s territorial integrity
By Vugar Khalilov
The Azerbaijani army is ready to swiftly foil any Armenian threat against the nation’s territorial integrity, Azernews reports, citing Col Elshad Abilov, deputy commander of a military unit.
Abilov made the remarks during a Social Research Center’s conference on the topic of "Armenia's war crimes against Azerbaijan over the past 30 years".
The officer stressed that the Azerbaijani army freed the occupied territories by bursting through the so-called 'Ohanyan line,' which Armenians claimed "impregnable".
Abilov emphasized that the Azerbaijani army responded appropriately to Armenia's provocations both during and after the second Karabakh war (2020).
"Armenia doesn't provide Azerbaijan with accurate maps of minefields. Sappers of the Azerbaijani army discovered and cleared 21,573 mines and unexploded ordnance in an area of 27,590 hectares after the second Karabakh war. In the post-war period, eight military personnel were killed and 85 were injured as a result of mine explosions," he said.
Abilov underlined that more Armenia-laid mines were discovered following the 44-day war in Azerbaijan’s Lachin and Kalbajar districts.
He added that mass graves discovered in the liberated Khojavand’s Farrukh and Adilli villages corroborate Armenia's war crimes against Azerbaijani military personnel, as well as civilians.
"Azerbaijan is certain that another mass grave will be discovered since up to 4,000 Azerbaijani citizens went missing during the first Karabakh war," Abilov added.
Addressing the event, Nemat Avazov, the head of the Investigation Department under the Prosecutor-General's Office, said that the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry has defused nearly 9,000 anti-personnel and 2,500 anti-tank mines, laid by Armenia in Lachin, Kalbajar, Dashkasan districts, as well as Tartar and Sugovushan directions since August 2022.
He underlined that a total of 34 Azerbaijani civilians were injured or killed as a result of the mine explosions in the mentioned period.
"These mines were deliberately laid by Armenia," he stressed.
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