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Azerbaijan says three servicemen killed in Karabakh fighting

The Armenian side continues to escalate the tension, Azerbaijan’s Defense Ministry reports

BAKU, April 4. /TASS/. Three Azeri servicemen were killed in fighting in the area of the Karabakh conflict, press service of Azerbaijan’s Defense Ministry reported on Monday.

"Though on April 3 Azerbaijan’s Armed Forces suspended unilaterally the attack and response measures against the enemy at the line of engagement, the Armenian side continues to escalate the tension."

The defense authority’s statement said "in order to recapture the left positions" the Armenian side "is attacking positions of the Azeri Armed Forces at the Agdere-Terter and Khodzhaven-Fizul directions and delivers intensive fire on the settlements along the line of engagement." The ministry’s information is that "three servicemen of Azerbaijan’s Armed Forces were killed."

On Saturday, April 2, the parties to the Karabakh conflict accused each other of violating truce along the front line. The claims came from defense authorities of Armenia and of Azerbaijan.

Neighboring Armenia and Azerbaijan fell out with each other in the late 1980s because of Nagorno-Karabakh, the disputed territory that had been part of Azerbaijan before the Soviet Union break-up but was mainly populated by Armenians.

In 1991-1994, the confrontation spilled over into large-scale military action for control over the enclave and some adjacent territories. Thousands left their homes on both sides in a conflict that killed 30,000. A truce was called between Armenia and the Nagorno-Karabakh republic on one side and Azerbaijan on the other in May 1994.

Talks on Nagorno-Karabakh have been held on the basis of the so-called Madrid Principles suggested by co-chairs of the Minsk Group of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) - Russia, France and the United States - in December 2007 in the Spanish capital. They include three key principles written in the Helsinki Final Act: refraining from the threat or use of force, territorial integrity and the right to self-determination.