The Azerbaijani Defense Ministry was quick to deny violating the ceasefire regime and accuse the Armenian side of spreading “disinformation.”
According to Karabakh officials, the Armenian-populated villages of Karmir Shuka and Taghavard came under “intense” Azerbaijani gunfire that lasted for 20 minutes. None of their residents was injured as a result.
Karabakh’s human rights ombudsman, Gegham Stepanian, said the small arms fire damaged a house in Karmir Shuka. He released a photograph of one of its windows pierced by two bullets.
“There is no gunfire at the moment and the villagers are going about their business,” a spokesman for the Karabakh interior ministry said, adding that Russian peacekeepers in Karabakh have been informed about the incident.
A Taghavard resident, Sergei Gevorgian, confirmed the reported shooting. “Nobody has left the village. We are already used [to such incidents,]” he told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service.
It was the first serious armed incident reported in Karabakh since March.
Armenia’s Defense Ministry reported, meanwhile, an Azerbaijani truce violation at one section of the Armenian-Azerbaijani border. Armenian troops guarding the border section returned fire, it said, adding that none of them was hurt in the skirmish.
The shootings incidents were reported amid what a senior Armenian lawmaker described earlier this week as preparations for another meeting of Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken held phone calls with both leaders on Monday. Blinken tweeted afterwards that he sees a “historic opportunity to achieve peace in the region.”
Tigran Grigorian, an Armenian political analyst, suggested that the reported truce violations signify the Azerbaijani leadership’s dissatisfaction with the current state of the peace process. He said Baku may be trying to ratchet up tensions in the Karabakh conflict zone in a bid to “clinch diplomatic-political concessions from Armenia.”