Azerbaijan does not recognize the ethnically Armenian self-proclaimed Nagorno-Karabakh Republic (NKR) and considers the Nagorno-Karabakh Defense Army to be a part of the Armed Forces of Armenia.
On April 2, Armenia and Azerbaijan declared a dramatic escalation of hostilities in the Nagorno-Karabakh region. Baku and Yerevan traded blame for breaching the truce in the conflict and reported heavy fighting in the area.
"Azerbaijan is more interested than the Armenian side in the creation of an international tribunal on the latest developments on the contact line and of the conflict in general," the ministry's press service said in a statement.
Initially, the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh began in 1988, when the Armenian-dominated autonomous region sought to secede from the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic, before proclaiming independence after the Soviet Union's collapse in 1991. The conflict escalated further in September 2015, with the sides blaming one another for violating the truce.
