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BRIEFING OF NKR DEPUTY DEFENSE MINISTER MAJOR-GENERAL VITALY BALASANIAN

Politics

On January 29, a briefing of NKR Deputy Defense Minister Vitaly Balasanian took place in Stepanakert. The Deputy Minister made the following statement:

On January 28, 2003, at 15.10 p.m., a serviceman of the NKR Defense Army was killed by an Azeri sniper at the Aghdam direction of the Azerbaijan and Nagorno Karabakh armed forces’ contact-line.

This criminal action was committed about 3 hours after the monitoring conducted by the OSCE mission in the mentioned region that day.

The NKR Defense Ministry evaluates the step of the Azerbaijan party as the grossest violation of the cease-fire regime.

I consider it necessary to remind that it is already the second violation of the cease-fire regime in this section, committed by Azerbaijan in January. Earlier, on January 8, 2003, an Azeri diversion-intelligence group attempted to break through in the Karabakh territory, in the same section. This was the reason that the Office of the OSCE Chairman-in-Office chose that section for conducting a regular monitoring of the conflicting parties’ contact-line.

As of the serviceman of the Azerbaijani Army, Abiyev, who was taken prisoner on January 8 by the Karabakh forces, his state of health is stably grave. He is kept in quite safe conditions and under constant control of local doctors. Permanent access to the wounded soldier is ensured for the representatives of the OSCE, as well as the International Committee of the Red Cross, including the doctors of this organization.

Despite the statement of Azerbaijan’s Defense Minister Safar Abiyev that negotiations on the extradition of Elmeddin Abiyev are taking place with the Armenian party, I must stress that the information is false. The corresponding bodies of NKR, in particular, the state committee on prisoners of war and missing persons did not receive any appeals on this issue.

Taking into account the state of health of the wounded and the doctors’ consideration on the necessity of continuing his treatment in Nagorno Karabakh, we reiterate our earlier readiness to receive S. Abiyev’s parents, ensuring their full security.