Officials said that Azerbaijan on Saturday (July 3) handed over 15 Armenian troops captured after armed conflict in the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region last year to Yerevan.
The Baku Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated that the move was part of the Russian mediation agreement, after Yerevan decided to release a map of the minefields in conflict areas to Baku.
In September 2020, fighting between Azerbaijan and Armenia took place in Nagorno-Karabakh, killing more than 6,500 people in six weeks.
The war ended in November with a ceasefire mediated by Russia, according to which Yerevan ceded large areas of Karabakh and its vicinity that had been controlled for decades.
“At the initiative of the Russian Federation, Armenia submitted to Azerbaijan a side map of approximately 92,000 anti-tank and anti-personnel mines planted during the occupation of the Fizuli and Zangilan regions.” The ministry returned to Azerbaijan last year. A statement.
“The Azerbaijani side handed over 15 Armenians to Armenia.”
A senior Azerbaijani diplomat told AFP that the 15 men were captured by the Azerbaijani army in December last year.
Last month, Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Garibashville, US and EU diplomats negotiated a similar agreement between Baku and Yerevan.
The Azerbaijani government stated that since the ceasefire, 7 Azerbaijani soldiers and 18 civilians have been killed by landmines and 110 people have been injured in Nagorno-Karabakh and its surrounding areas.
During the bloody conflict in the early 1990s, both the Azerbaijani and Armenian forces planted landmines.
Aliyev stated in May that Azerbaijan was ready for peace talks with Armenia, and Pashinyan later announced that the two former Soviet Union countries were discussing the delimitation and demarcation of the common border.
With the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Armenian national separatists of Nagorno-Karabakh separated from Azerbaijan, and the ensuing conflict has claimed approximately 30,000 lives.
