(Azatutyun)- Armenia has confirmed casualties – both killed and wounded soldiers – as a result of border clashes with Azerbaijan, the country’s Defense Ministry said on Tuesday afternoon.
In a statement the ministry said that information about casualties was still being specified. It added that Armenian armed forces also lost two military posts as a result of fighting along the border.
“As of 4 p.m., the situation on the eastern border of Armenia continues to remain extremely tense,” the Armenian Defense Ministry said.
Earlier, military authorities in Yerevan confirmed that four Armenian soldiers were wounded in clashes with Azerbaijani armed forces.
Baku has so far reported about two wounded Azerbaijani soldiers.
After days of reported incidents along their volatile border, intensive fighting erupted between Armenia and Azerbaijan on November 16, with both sides accusing each other of provoking and starting the conflict.
Reports from both sides suggest the application of armored vehicles, artillery, mortars, and other weapons in the ongoing battles.
Armenia, which is a military and political ally of Russia, has appealed to Moscow to protect its territorial integrity in the face of Azerbaijan’s aggression, Security Council Secretary Armen Grigorian told Armenia’s Public Television earlier on Tuesday.
Armenia’s Foreign Ministry also issued a statement, stressing that under the UN Charter, the republic has the right to repel aggression against its territorial integrity and sovereignty “by all available means.”
“We call on the international community and our international partners – Russia, CSTO, OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairmanship and Co-Chair countries – to express a clear and targeted response to these actions of the Azerbaijani side, which undermine regional peace and security, and undertake effective steps aimed at its prevention as well as unconditional and complete withdrawal of the Azerbaijani armed forces from the territory of the Republic of Armenia,” the ministry said.
The latest flare-up of tensions between Armenia and Azerbaijan comes amid a call from international mediators to de-escalate the situation along the volatile border.
In a statement issued late on Monday, the American, Russian and French co-chairs of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe’s Minsk Group also urged the sides “to refrain from inflammatory rhetoric and provocative actions, and implement in full the commitments they undertook under the November 9 statement and other jointly agreed [Nagorno-Karabakh] ceasefire arrangements.”