Renewed border clashes have erupted between Armenian and Azerbaijani forces, according to Yerevan, a day after deadly fighting threatened to derail European Union-led weekend peace talks between the Caucasus arch-foes.
Border clashes on Thursday left an Azerbaijani serviceman dead and four Armenian troops injured.
“On May 12, at around 10am, the Azerbaijani Armed Forces violated the ceasefire in the direction of Sotk using UAVs. Two servicemen of the Armenian Armed Forces were wounded. The health condition of one serviceman is assessed as satisfactory and [that of] the other one is critical,” the statement said.
The ministry also reported that as of 10:30am, the situation at the front line is relatively stable.
Baku and Yerevan are locked in a decades-long territorial dispute over Azerbaijan’s Armenian-populated region of Nagorno-Karabakh, over which they have fought two wars.
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev are scheduled to meet on Sunday in Brussels for talks led by European Council President Charles Michel.
The rival leaders had also agreed to jointly meet the leaders of France and Germany on the sidelines of a European summit in Moldova on June 1, according to the EU.
Pashinyan on Thursday accused Azerbaijan of looking to “undermine the talks” in Brussels.
He warned there was “very little” chance of signing a peace deal with Azerbaijan at the meeting.
A draft agreement “is still at a very preliminary stage and it is too early to speak of an eventual signature”, Pashinyan continued.
