Azerbaijani Defense Minister Zakir Hasanov and Chief of Staff of NATO Allied Land Command Mustafa Oguz have met to discuss the situation on the Azerbaijani-Armenian border and in conflict-torn Nagorno-Karabakh, Azerbaijani Defense Ministry said on Thursday
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 09th March, 2023) Azerbaijani Defense Minister Zakir Hasanov and Chief of Staff of NATO Allied Land Command Mustafa Oguz have met to discuss the situation on the Azerbaijani-Armenian border and in conflict-torn Nagorno-Karabakh, Azerbaijani Defense Ministry said on Thursday.
"On March 9, the Minister of Defense of the Republic of Azerbaijan, Colonel General Zakir Hasanov met with the Chief of Staff of NATO Allied Land Command, Lieutenant General Mustafa Oguz, who is on an official visit to Azerbaijan," the ministry said in a statement, adding that "Colonel General Z. Hasanov informed the guest about the reforms carried out in the Azerbaijan Army... the work done in the liberated territories, as well as the current situation on the Azerbaijani-Armenian conditional state border and the Karabakh economic region."
The sides also discussed cooperation between Baku and NATO, as well as other topics of the bilateral agenda, according to the ministry. Oguz thanked the Azerbaijani side for the assistance provided after the devastating earthquakes in Turkey and expressed his condolences over Azerbaijani soldiers killed in the March 5 incident in Nagorno-Karabakh.
On Monday, the Russian Defense Ministry said that the Azerbaijani military shelled a car with law enforcement officers of Nagorno-Karabakh on March 5. As a result of the incident, three people from Nagorno-Karabakh were killed and one person was injured, while, from the Azerbaijani side, two soldiers were killed and one was wounded. Russian peacekeepers stopped the clash in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict zone.
The conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region (also known as the self-proclaimed Republic of Artsakh) has been smoldering since the collapse of the Soviet Union. In September 2022, a new wave of hostilities between Yerevan and Baku broke out in an area unrelated to Nagorno-Karabakh, marking the most serious escalation since 2020.
In 2022, Yerevan and Baku, with the mediation of Russia, the United States and the European Union, began discussing a future peace treaty.
