“Azerbaijan restored its sovereignty as a result of successful anti-terrorist measures in Karabakh,” Aliyev said in a televised address on Wednesday.
Azerbaijan starts new attack on Armenians in disputed territory
Azerbaijan starts new attack on Armenians in disputed territory
He claimed that most of the Armenian forces in the region had been destroyed and said the withdrawal of separatist troops had already begun.
The attack left “at least 200 killed and more than 400 wounded”, Nagorno-Karabakh separatist official Gegham Stepanyan said.
Late on Wednesday, Armenia’s defence ministry said Azerbaijan had fired on its positions along the border between the arch-foes. Such frontier skirmishes are frequent.
Under the truce, the separatists said they had agreed to fully dismantle their army and that Armenia would pull out any forces it had in the region.
Azerbaijan’s defence ministry said “all weapons and heavy armaments are to be surrendered” under the supervision of Russia’s 2,000-strong peacekeeping force on the ground.
Both sides said talks on reintegrating the breakaway territory into the rest of Azerbaijan would be held on Thursday in the city of Yevlakh.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said Moscow’s peacekeepers would mediate the talks.
Moscow – the traditional regional power broker – has said several members of its force in Karabakh were killed when their car came under fire.
Baku’s operation was the latest violent confrontation over Nagorno-Karabakh.
After the Soviet Union fell apart, Armenian separatists seized the region – internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan – in the early 1990s.
That sparked a war that left 30,000 people dead and displaced hundreds of thousands.
In a six-week war in 2020, Azerbaijan recaptured swathes of territory in and around the region.
EU tries to push Azerbaijan-Armenia peace as Russia offers more talks
EU tries to push Azerbaijan-Armenia peace as Russia offers more talks
President Aliyev said this week’s events “will have a positive impact on the peace process between Azerbaijan and Armenia”.
His foreign policy adviser Hikmet Hajiyev promised safe passage for the separatists who surrendered and said Baku sought the “peaceful reintegration” of Karabakh Armenians.
A separatist official said more than 10,000 people had been evacuated from Armenian communities in Nagorno-Karabakh.
Putin said he hoped for a “peaceful” resolution, adding that Moscow had been in contact with all sides in the conflict.
The Russian leader held talks with Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan Wednesday evening, but the Kremlin insisted the crisis was “Azerbaijan’s internal affair”.
Jubilant residents in Azerbaijan’s capital expressed hope the deal heralded a definitive victory and the end of the decades-long conflict.
In Armenia, there was fury at a second defeat in Karabakh in three years.
US sees ‘historic’ chance for peace in Nagorno-Karabakh
US sees ‘historic’ chance for peace in Nagorno-Karabakh
Clashes broke out in the capital Yerevan, where thousands of protesters waving the separatist region’s flag blocked a main road and riot police guarded official buildings.
Demonstrators threw bottles and stones at police as they slammed the government’s handling of the crisis. Officers used stun grenades and made arrests.
The loss in Karabakh ratchets up domestic pressure on Pashinyan, who has faced stinging criticism at home for making concessions to Azerbaijan since 2020.
The Armenian leader has insisted that his government had not been involved in drafting the latest ceasefire deal.
Again denying his country’s army was in the enclave, he said he expected Russia’s peacekeepers to ensure Karabakh’s ethnic-Armenian residents could stay “in their homes, on their land”.
Turkey, a historic ally of predominantly Muslim Azerbaijan that views mostly Christian Armenia as one of its main regional rivals, had called the operation “justified”.
The EU and United States had been mediating talks between Baku and Yerevan in recent months aimed at securing a lasting peace deal between the two foes.
The White House said Wednesday it was concerned by the humanitarian situation in Nagorno-Karabakh, while French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna warned of a risk of the crisis escalating into an all-out war between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
“As for the possibility that Armenia may, in spite of itself, find itself involved … I think we need to remind the international community to be highly vigilant.”