An Artsakh soldier monitoring the line of contact

An Azerbaijani forces attempted to breach the Artsakh-Azerbaijan border during an operation on Sunday afternoon, resulting in the death of an Azerbaijani soldier.

Praising the precision of the Artsakh Armed Forces, the Artakh defense ministry announced that there were no casualties on the Artsakh side, and its forces successfully warded off the attack by Azerbaijani forces, which took place at 4:15 p.m. local time on Sunday.

The Azerbaijani military on Monday confirmed the combat death and identified the sodier as Ramin Abdulrahmanov. The Azerbaijani military claimed that Abdulrahmanov accidentally lost his way.

Armenian authorities, working with International Committee of the Red Cross, returned the remains of the soldier to Azerbaijan.

“Yesterday at the request and agreement of the parties the ICRC as a neutral mediator participated in the operation of retrieving the body of the deceased from the line of contact,” said the ICRC Artsakh mission’s communications officer Eteri Musayelyan on Tuesday.

Artsakh presidential adviser Tigran Abrahamyan said Tuesday that Abdulrahimov was identified as being a serviceman of the Azerbaijani special brigade, countering Azerbaijani claims that he accidentally lost his way.

“Accordingly, the subversive attack was entrusted to the military servicemen of this very brigade,” said Abrahamyan.

As reported earlier, on September 22, at about 4:15pm, the Azerbaijani side carried out subversive infiltration attempt into an Artsakh Defense Army combat position located on the southeastern sector of the line of contact between the Artsakh-Azerbaijani opposing troops.

“As a result of the competent actions by the DA position-holding personnel, the adversary was driven back to its initial positions, leaving one dead body at the neutral zone,” Artsrun Hovhannisyan, Spokesperson of the Ministry of Defense of Armenia, noted this in a Facebook post. “The DA has not had any losses.”

Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, Armenia’s Defense Minister Davit Tonoyan called the most recent Azerbaijani attack “strange.”

“It was very strange in terms of the hour of the operation, the number of personnel involved, the involvement of representatives of the special division; at least as was reported,” Tonoyan said.