Nagorno-Karabakh, Azerbaijan Register Repeated Ceasefire Violations Overnight

YEREVAN (Sputnik) — The self-proclaimed Nagorno-Karabakh Republic's (NKR) and Azerbaijan's Defense Ministries exchanged mutual accusations of multiple ceasefire violations on the line of contact overnight into Sunday.

"Overnight July 30 into July 31, the Azerbaijan's armed forces violated ceasefire regime 46 times along the line of contact, firing over 600 shots of various caliber toward Armenian positions," the NKR Defense Ministry said, adding that one soldier sustained injuries.

According to Baku, the Azerbaijani positions were shelled six times overnight.

"Despite the ceasefire agreement on the line of contact, the Armenian side violated ceasefire along the line six times in 24 hours," the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry's press service said.

On April 2, tensions in Nagorno-Karabakh, an Azerbaijani breakaway region with a predominantly Armenian population, escalated. Baku and Yerevan accused each other of provoking the hostilities, however, the sides succeeded in reaching a ceasefire agreement on April 5, which has been followed by near-daily reports of truce violations.

Armenia and Azerbaijan have been engaged in a dispute over Nagorno-Karabakh since 1988, when the autonomous region left the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic and proclaimed independence after the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. The secession triggered a war that lasted until a Russia-brokered ceasefire was signed in 1994.