Nagorno-Karabakh: Key cities targeted in Armenian, Azeri shelling Each side has accused the other of targeting civilian areas, as the conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh escalates.
![The aftermath of recent shelling during the ongoing fighting between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region, in the disputed region's main city of Stepanakert [Karo Sahakyan /AFP via Armenian Government]](https://www.aljazeera.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/000_8RE68G.jpg?resize=770%2C513)
The aftermath of recent shelling during the ongoing fighting between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region, in the disputed region’s main city of Stepanakert [Karo Sahakyan /AFP via Armenian Government]
As Armenia and Azerbaijan continue their clash over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region for a second week, both countries have blamed each other for targeting important cities and endangering the lives of civilians.
Armenia’s government-run information centre has released footage purportedly showing artillery attacks by Azeri forces on Sunday in the city of Stepanakert.
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Armenian authorities claimed civilian casualties as a result of Sunday’s attack.
The video shows severely damaged buildings, including an apartment block, and a street covered in debris.
Al Jazeera’s Bernard Smith was forced to leave Stepanakert on Sunday night due to “intense bombardment”, which he said killed five civilians.
Armenia’s ministry of defence tweeted that Azeri forces had fired rockets at Stepanakert and Shushi “with great intensity”.
“Fierce fighting engagements are ongoing,” the ministry tweeted on Monday.
Anna Naghdalyan, spokeswoman for Armenia’s ministry of foreign affairs, said on Monday that Stepanakert is being “continuously attacked by Azerbaijani armed forces with cluster munitions”.
Azerbaijan’s defence ministry said Armenian forces were shelling three of its towns – Beylagan, Barda, and Terter – after hitting Ganja and Mingecevir, the country’s second and fourth-largest cities respectively, on Sunday.
Hikmet Hajiyev, head of Azerbaijan’s Foreign Policy Affairs Department, tweeted that four Tochka ballistic missiles had been launched at Mingecevir, which has a population of more than 100,000 and is located 100km (62 miles) from Armenia’s border.
However, Shushan Stepanyan, press secretary for Armenia’s defence ministry, dismissed Azerbaijan’s accusations that Armenia was targeting Mingecevir as false.
“No fire was opened from Armenia,” Stepanyan tweeted. “This is the desperate convulsions of the Azerbaijani side.”
Reporting from Mingecevir, Al Jazeera’s Sinem Koseoglu said she witnessed three missiles falling.
“Two of them hit close to the hydroelectric power plant,” she said. “One other hit the city centre and the fourth hit close by a maternity [unit] where a building was damaged and two civilians were injured.”
Mingecevir’s hydroelectric plant supplies electricity to the entire country, and the city also has a large water reservoir which Koseoglu said Armenia had threatened to target.
“If the water reservoir is hit, 14 cities of Azerbaijan would be flooded,” she said.
“The Azeris are saying the concept of the conflict is transforming into another one where long-range missiles are involved and crowded cities and strategic destinations are targeted, which would have more catastrophic outcomes if the missiles hit their targets,” she continued.
The International Committee of the Red Cross on Sunday condemned reports of “indiscriminate shelling and other alleged unlawful attacks using explosive weaponry in cities, towns and other populated areas”.
A view of the damage after Azerbaijan accused the Armenian army’s of attacking Ganja city with long-range missiles [Resul Rehimov/Anadolu Agency]
Escalating conflict
The latest clashes erupted on September 27 and have killed dozens, marking the biggest escalation in a decades-old conflict over the region, which lies within Azerbaijan but is controlled by local ethnic Armenian forces backed by Armenia.
In a fiery address to the nation on Sunday, Azerbaijani President Aliyev set several stiff conditions for a ceasefire.
He said Armenian forces “must leave our territories, not in words but in deeds”, provide a timetable for a full withdrawal, apologise to the Azerbaijani people and recognise the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan.
Yerevan rejected Aliyev’s demands.
Karabakh’s presidency threatened to “expand subsequent (military) actions to the entire territory of Azerbaijan”.
Armenian sources have put the death toll from fighting in the region – home to about 145,000 people – at more than 200, while Azerbaijan most recently said that 19 civilians have been killed and 60 injured.
Russia, which has a base in Armenia and also supplies weapons to Azerbaijan, has expressed concerns about the rising number of civilian victims.
Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov called for a ceasefire as soon as possible in a telephone call with his Armenian counterpart Zohrab Mnatsakanyan on Sunday.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel also demanded an immediate end to all fighting during a phone call with Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan.
Azerbaijan and Armenia previously fought a war over Nagorno-Karabakh in the late 1980s and early 1990s as they transitioned into independent countries amid the collapse of the Soviet Union.
The war, which ended with a fragile peace treaty in 1994, is estimated to have killed tens of thousands of people, including more than a thousand civilians.
SOURCE : AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES