Azernews.Az

By Sara Rajabova

James Warlick, the U.S. co-chairman of the OSCE Minsk Group has condemned the ceasefire violation during the OSCE monitoring.

He called the violation of ceasefire during the monitoring unacceptable.

The monitoring was held on the contact line between Armenian-Azerbaijani armed forces in Azerbaijan’s Tartar region on October 27.

“During our Line of Contact crossing, repeated gunfire forced OSCE monitors to take cover,” Warlick wrote on his Twitter page. “This is unacceptable.”

During the monitoring, OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs Igor Popov (Russia), Warlick, Pierre Andrieu (France) and Personal Representative of the OSCE Chairperson-in-Office Andrzej Kasprzyk crossed from the opposite side of the contact line to that controlled by the Azerbaijani armed forces.

Despite an agreement on the adherence to the ceasefire regime, machine gun fire from enemy positions toward Azerbaijani positions was seen, the Azerbaijani defense ministry reported.

The ministry said the shootings ceased after immediate intervention from the co-chairs.

This is not the only case when the Armenian military has breached the ceasefire regime during the OSCE monitoring.

Armenia and Azerbaijan fought a lengthy war that ended with the signing of a fragile ceasefire in 1994. More than 20,000 Azerbaijanis were killed and over 1 million were displaced as a result of the large-scale hostilities. Since the war, the Armenian armed forces have occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan's territory, including Nagorno-Karabakh and seven surrounding regions.

Armenia continues the occupation in defiance of four UN Security Council resolutions calling for immediate and unconditional withdrawal of armed forces.

Peace talks brokered by mediators from Russia, France and the U.S. have produced no results so far.

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Sara Rajabova is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @SaraRajabova

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