ARMENIAN SOLDIER KILLED IN FIRE FROM AZERBAIJAN: YEREVAN
Agence France Presse — English
May 29, 2006 Monday 4:51 PM GMT
An Armenian soldier was killed in cross-border fire from Azerbaijan,
the Armenian defence ministry said Monday, in violation of a ceasefire
observed by the two estranged countries.
The soldier, who died from his injuries on his way to hospital, was
shot late on Saturday in northeast Armenia, in violation of the 1994
ceasefire, it said.
But the report was denied by Azerbaijan.
The Russian Ria-Novosti news agency quoted the authorities
in Azerbaijan as saying that Azerbaijani soldiers had not fired,
but that one of their soldiers had been shot by Armenian forces,
according to the defence ministry.
Armenia and Azerbaijan fought a six-year war over the Armenian-majority
enclave of Nagorno Karabakh, which seceded from Azerbaijan in the
early 1980s.
The conflict claimed 25,000 lives and displaced hundreds of thousands
of people, ending in a 1994 ceasefire.
Since then, tensions have remained high between the two countries
and incidents occur regularly, with each side blaming the other.