Azerbaijan reports attack on its troops in Nagorno-Karabakh

The ministry said the attack took place in the south of Nagorno-Karabakh on Sunday afternoon and was thwarted, leaving all six attackers dead. The Nagorno-Karabakh military dismissed the statement as “misinformation” and a “propaganda provocation”.

Azerbaijan’s Defense Ministry said Monday its army units have been attacked by “an illegal Armenian armed group” in Nagorno-Karabakh, killing one Azerbaijani serviceman and wounding another.

Heavy fighting erupted in late September in the biggest escalation of the decades-old conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan (AP)

The ministry said the attack took place in the south of Nagorno-Karabakh on Sunday afternoon and was thwarted, leaving all six attackers dead.

The Nagorno-Karabakh military dismissed the statement as “misinformation” and a “propaganda provocation,” saying that the territory’s army was “strictly observing” the cease-fire. Earlier on Monday the Armenian Defence Ministry also denied media reports of fighting in the south of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Nagorno-Karabakh lies within Azerbaijan but was under the control of ethnic Armenian forces backed by Armenia since a separatist war there ended in 1994. That war left Nagorno-Karabakh itself and substantial surrounding territory in Armenian hands.

Heavy fighting erupted in late September in the biggest escalation of the decades-old conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan, killing more than 5,600 people on both sides. A Russian-brokered peace deal that saw Azerbaijan reclaim much of the separatist region along with surrounding areas ended six weeks of fierce fighting on November 10.