TURKEY today vowed complete support for Baku and called on Armenia to give up its “aggression” after heavy fighting erupted in Azerbaijan’s breakaway region of Nagorny Karabakh.

The worst clashes since 2016 broke out today between arch-foes Azerbaijan and Armenia, who have been locked for decades in a territorial dispute over Nagorny Karabakh.

Turkey is a key ally of Baku, with close cultural and linguistic ties with Azerbaijan.

Ankara has no diplomatic relations with Yerevan due to a dispute over the mass killings of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire, which Armenia calls genocide.

“The Turkish people will support our Azerbaijani brothers with all our means as always,” Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan tweeted.

He accused Armenia of “being the biggest threat in the region to peace and stability” and criticised the international community for failing to give the “necessary and sufficient reaction” to Armenia’s “aggression”.

Erdogan also said he held a phone call with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, during which he was “witness once again to his shrewd and determined position”.

“The greatest obstacle to peace and stability in the Caucasus is Armenia’s aggression, and it should give up this aggression, which will throw the region into fire,” Turkish Defence Minister Hulusi Akar said in a statement.

Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin “strongly” condemned the clashes and said Armenia “once again violated international law”.

He called on the international community to “say stop to this dangerous provocation” in a tweet.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu and Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov discussed the crisis today during a telephone conversation, a Turkish diplomatic source said, without giving details. 

Meanwhile, Germany called for an “immediate” halt to the fighting between Armenian and Azerbaijani separatists, saying the conflict can only be resolved through dialogue.

“I call on both parties to the conflict to immediately stop all hostilities, especially the shelling of villages and towns,” Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said in a statement, voicing “alarm” at reports of civilian casualties.

He urged a return to talks to resolve the dispute over the breakaway region, saying that the so-called Minsk Group “stood ready” to help.

“The conflict over the Nagorno-Karabakh region can only be resolved through negotiations,” added the German minister, whose country currently holds the rotating EU presidency. 

Russia, France and the EU swiftly urged an “immediate ceasefire”, while Pope Francis prayed for peace.

In a televised address to the nation earlier in the day, Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev vowed victory over Armenian forces.

“Our cause is just and we will win,” Aliyev said, repeating a famous quote from Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin’s address at the outbreak of World War II in Russia.

“Karabakh is Azerbaijan,” he said.  

Both Armenia and the breakaway region of Nagorny Karabakh declared martial law and military mobilisation. 

Armenia said earlier today that Azerbaijan attacked civilian settlements in Nagorny Karabakh, including the main city Stepanakert.

Azerbaijan accused Armenian forces of violating a ceasefire, saying it had launched a counter-offensive to “ensure the safety of the population”, using tanks, artillery missiles, combat aviation and drones.

“There are reports of dead and wounded among civilians and military servicemen,” Azerbaijan’s Foreign Ministry said. “Extensive damage has been inflicted on many homes and civilian infrastructure.”

Karabakh’s rights ombudsman Artak Beglaryan pointed to “civilian casualties,” while Armenia said a woman and child were killed. 

Ethnic Armenian separatists seized the Nagorny Karabakh region from Baku in a 1990s war that claimed 30,000 lives.

Talks to resolve one of the worst conflicts to emerge from the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union have been largely stalled since a 1994 ceasefire agreement.

France, Russia and the United States have mediated peace efforts as the “Minsk Group” but the last big push for a peace deal collapsed in 2010. – AFP, September 27, 2020.