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Armenia–Azerbaijan conflict

Baku vows to retaliate if Armenia employs Iskander missile systems

Renewed clashes between Azerbaijan and Armenia erupted on September 27, with intense battles raging in the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh

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BAKU, October 6. /TASS/. Azerbaijan will take adequate retaliatory measures, if Armenia employs Iskander tactical missile systems, Azerbaijani Defense Minister Zakir Hasanov said at a special ministerial meeting, the ministry’s press office reported on Tuesday.

"The defense minister stated that adequate retaliatory measures would be taken if the enemy employed Iskander tactical missile systems. The minister ordered the Azerbaijani army to plan measures for delivering strikes against the military and strategic infrastructure on the enemy’s territory, employing available armaments of large destructive power," the press office said in a statement.

The participants in the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry’s special meeting "analyzed the current situation with the ongoing counteroffensive and gave instructions to continue the systematic, purposeful and consistent destruction of the enemy forces," the statement says.

The Azerbaijani defense minister also ordered the troops "to take vitally important and required measures on the liberated territories," the press office said.

Renewed clashes between Azerbaijan and Armenia erupted on September 27, with intense battles raging in the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh. The area experienced flare-ups of violence in the summer of 2014, in April 2016 and this past July. Azerbaijan and Armenia have imposed martial law and launched mobilization efforts. Both parties to the conflict have reported casualties, among them civilians.

The conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the highland region of Nagorno-Karabakh, a disputed territory that had been part of Azerbaijan before the Soviet Union break-up, but primarily populated by ethnic Armenians, broke out in February 1988 after the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Region announced its withdrawal from the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic.

In 1992-1994, tensions boiled over and exploded into large-scale military action for control over the enclave and seven adjacent territories after Azerbaijan lost control of them. Talks on the Nagorno-Karabakh settlement have been ongoing since 1992 under the OSCE Minsk Group, led by its three co-chairs - Russia, France and the United States.

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