Armenia is reporting peace after the recent conflicts with Azerbaijan

September 16, 2022: -On Wednesday, a senior Armenian official added that Azerbaijan had agreed upon peace after two days of violence linked to a decades-old dispute amid the ex-Soviet states over Nagorno-Karabakh.

There was no word from Azerbaijan regarding a truce to halt the deadliest exchanges between the countries since 2020.

Russia is the pre-eminent diplomatic force in the area and maintains 2,000 peacekeepers. Moscow is brokering the deal that ended the 2020 fighting dubbed the second Karabakh war, in which hundreds died.

Russian news agencies are quoting Armen Grigoryan, Secretary of Armenia’s Security Council, which tells Armenian television, “Being grateful to the involvement of the international community, an agreement has been hit on a cease-fire.”

The announcement added that the truce is being in effect for several hours. Armenia’s defense ministry said that the shooting in border areas had stopped.

Each side blames the difference for the fresh clashes.

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan had told parliament that 105 Armenian servicemen had been killed since the violence started this week.

Azerbaijan reports almost 50 military deaths on the first day of fighting. Reuters was not unable to check the two sides’ accounts.

Grigory Karasin, a senior member of Russia’s upper parliament, told the RIA news agency that the truce was clinched through Russian diplomatic efforts.

Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin is speaking to Pashinyan, he said. Putin appealed for calm following the violence erupted, and different countries called for restraint on both sides.

Pashinyan added that his country had appealed to the Moscow-led Collective Security Treaty Organization to help restore its territorial integrity in his address to parliament.

“If we say that Azerbaijan is carrying out aggression against Armenia, it means that they are managing to establish control more than some territories,” Russia’s Tass agency quoted him as saying.