Nagorno-Karabakh truce holds, but residents fear renewed violence

TALYSH, Azerbaijan: Elmira Bagiryan, a resident of a village at the epicentre of four days of fierce fighting between Azerbaijan and ethnic Armenian forces, said on Wednesday that the shooting had stopped but she was leaving anyway because she feared it could start again.

The village of Talysh was briefly occupied by Azeri troops during four days of battles over Azerbaijan’s breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region which subsided on Tuesday afternoon when both sides agreed to a ceasefire.

Russia said it had played a lead role in brokering a halt to the violence, hosting a previously-undisclosed meeting between military chiefs from ex-Soviet Armenia and Azerbaijan.

The fighting was the most intense since a war over Nagorno-Karabakh in the early 1990s, and raised fears of a return to all-out war in a region that serves as a corridor for pipelines taking oil and gas to world markets.

The guns had fallen silent in Talysh, a few kilometres from the Azeri town of Barda on the northernmost edge of separatist-held territory, on Wednesday afternoon. Ethnic Armenian troops, firmly back in control, milled around, smiling.

There were signs though of the ferocity of the fighting of previous days. Several houses had been destroyed by shellfire.

The hulk of a burnt out car lay by the road. Nearby were the carcasses of several cows.

Bagiryan, a grey-haired ethnic Armenian in her early 60s, said three village residents had been killed.

Sobbing and close to tears, she said she had spent days and nights in the cellar of a neighbour’s house, taking refuge from the shelling.

Quiet had returned on Tuesday when the ceasefire was agreed, but she planned to leave all the same.

“We are afraid that the shooting will begin again,” she told Reuters, as she prepared to board a car laden with carpets, pillows, blankets and furniture from her home.

Other residents also were using the lull as an opportunity to get out. On the roads in the area, cars and trucks loaded with belongings were heading away from the front line.