TWO AZERBAIJAN SOLDIERS DIE AFTER EXCHANGE OF FIRE WITH ARMENIA
By Zulfugar Agayev
Business Week
Oct 6 2011
Oct. 6 (Bloomberg) — Two Azeri soldiers were killed during an exchange
of fire with Armenian troops along the former Soviet republics’
militarized cease-fire line yesterday, Azerbaijan’s Defense Ministry
said.
The servicemen were fatally wounded while “repelling Armenian attacks”
near the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh, ministry spokesman
Teymur Abdullayev said by phone today in the capital, Baku.
Oil-rich Azerbaijan fought a war with Armenia over Nagorno- Karabakh,
a majority Armenian-populated enclave that broke free of Baku’s control
following the disintegration of the Soviet Union in 1991. The territory
remains a potential flash point in a region where Russia fought a
five-day war with Georgia in 2008 after separatist tensions flared up.
While the hostilities largely ended after a Russia-brokered cease-fire
in 1994, the countries have failed to reach a peace agreement.
Companies led by London-based BP Plc have invested more than $31
billion in Azerbaijan’s oil and gas fields since 1991.
–With assistance from Paul Abelsky in Moscow. Editors: Paul Abelsky,
Torrey Clark