Defense Ministry: Simmering War on the Border

Armenian Defense Ministry Spokesperson Artsrun Hovhannisyan.

A war is simmering on the border according to Armenia’s Defense Ministry Spokesperson Artsrun Hovhannisyan. During a meeting with reporters on February 6, Hovhannisyan said that if Armenia does not respond adequately to the countless ceasefire violations being committed by the Azerbaijani side, Armenia will start to lose the war. “Every single day, the military command is searching for new ways, and is responding to their every ‘innovation’ with more ‘innovation,’” Hovhannisyan said.

On February 5, border villages in the Tavush marz came under heavy Azerbaijani gunfire once again. A resident of the village of Nerkin Karmiraghypyur, 61-year-old Vanik Ghukasyan was killed during that attack. Hovhannisyan said that his death would be avenged.

“Unlike them, our battle is not with peaceful civilians. We know our adversary well, he is the soldier sitting in the trenches,” the spokesman noted.

Since the beginning of 2015, there have been a number of bloody clashes along the Armenia-Azerbaijan state border and the Karabakh-Azerbaijan Line of Contact resulting in a number of casualties for both sides.

During a working visit to Munich on February 5, Armenia’s Foreign Affairs Minister Edward Nalbandyan met with the co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group. The discussion centered on the Karabakh peace process. Nalbandyan spoke about the dangerous increase in tensions along the Karabakh-Azerbaijan Line of Contact and the Armenia-Azerbaijan state border in recent months. He underscored that the Azerbaijani side had violated the ceasefire regime over 3000 times resulting in material and human (both military and civilian) loss on both sides. There has also been an increase of commando raids by special units of the Azerbaijani military attempting incursions into Armenian territories.

Nalbandyan said, “The Azerbaijani leadership is flagrantly disregarding calls by the international community and through its reckless policy and provocative actions is further exacerbating the situation, and hampering the peace process.”