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Five killed as car strikes landmine in Azerbaijan’s Fizuli District

The Investigative Department of the Prosecutor General’s Office is commissioned to conduct the investigation

BAKU, November 28. /TASS/. Five civilians were killed when their passenger vehicle struck a landmine in a village in the Fizuli District (now controlled by Azerbaijan), adjacent to Nagorno-Karabakh, Azerbaijan’s Prosecutor General’s Office said in a statement on Saturday.

"On November 28, at 15.20 local time, a Toyota car struck, according to a preliminary version, an antitank mine in the village of Ashagi-Seidahmedli in Fizuli District, liberated from occupation, and five citizens of Azerbaijan, who were in the car, were killed," the statement said.

A criminal case was opened under Articles 100.2 (planning, preparation, unleashing or waging an aggressive war) and 116.0.6 (violation of international humanitarian law during armed conflicts) of the Criminal Code of Azerbaijan. The Investigative Department of the Prosecutor General’s Office is commissioned to conduct the investigation.

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

On November 9, Russian President Vladimir Putin, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan signed a joint statement on a complete ceasefire in Nagorno-Karabakh starting from November 10. The Russian leader said the Azerbaijani and Armenian sides would maintain the positions that they had held and Russian peacekeepers would be deployed to the region.

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