Asia-Pacific

Armenia announces the capture of over 60 soldiers by Azerbaijani forces

The President of the Karabakh Republic, Arayk Harutyunyan, confirmed the capture of dozens of Armenian soldiers by Azerbaijani forces near the village of Khatzaburd in the southern part of this region last week.

In a statement posted on his Facebook page, Harutyunyan said: “Unfortunately, several dozen of our military personnel were captured near Khatzaburd. The Ministry of Defense is currently working to uncover all the circumstances of the incident.”

The President of the Republic pledged to make all possible efforts to return the prisoners  as soon as possible.

For his part, the KarabakhCommissioner for Human Rights, Artak Beglarian, revealed that “about 60 members of several Armenian military units have gone missing in recent days near the village of Khatzaurd.” The official did not rule out that the talks are about soldiers who appeared in a video tape published by the Azerbaijani side.

Earlier on Wednesday, the Karabakh Defense Forces announced that it had lost contact with members of a number of combat sites deployed towards the villages of Hein Tahir in Hadrut District. He indicated that measures have been taken by Russian peacekeepers to find out the fate of these soldiers.

The commander of the Russian peacekeepers in the region, Rustam Muradov, announced that the situation in the Hadrut District, which witnessed a violation of the ceasefire, had returned to normal, after the intervention of the Russian forces.

The Armenian Ministry of Defense announced that units of the Azerbaijani army attacked, on December 12, the villages of Hein Tahir and Khatzaburd, adding that the clash left six wounded from the Armenian side and several dead and wounded among the Azerbaijani forces.

For its part, Baku confirmed the killing of four soldiers from its forces were killed and a number of others wounded during those clashes.

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