BAKU. March 7 (Interfax) - Azerbaijan will take all necessary measures to disarm and neutralize Armenian formations in Karabakh, the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry said in a statement on Monday.
"We confirm once again that the transportation of military cargoes by the Armenian side to the territory of Azerbaijan and the dispatch and rotation of Armenian Armed Forces personnel must be stopped immediately once and for all, while Armenian troops must be withdrawn completely from the territory of our country. Otherwise, the Azerbaijani side will have to take necessary measures, using all available capabilities, in order to disarm and neutralize illegal Armenian armed formations," the Defense Ministry said.
In defiance of the provisions of the November 10, 2020 trilateral statement, Armenia is continuing to deliver weapons, ammunition, supplies, and other military hardware to Armenian armed formations in Karabakh and to rotate their personnel, it said.
"In order to immediately prevent such unacceptable developments, the Russian peacekeeping contingent must fulfill its duties without any delay," it said.
On March 5, after receiving relevant information, units of the Azerbaijani Armed Forces tried to stop and check an Armenian military vehicle, the ministry said.
"As they approached the vehicle, Azerbaijani servicemen came under automatic weapon fire opened by members of an Armenian armed group sitting in the car, as a result, two Azerbaijani servicemen were killed and one was wounded. Three members of this illegal Armenian group were killed and one was wounded by return fire," the ministry said.
"Portraying these Armenian servicemen, who were fully equipped with weapons and munitions, as policemen in charge of 'passport and visa' issues is nothing other than hypocrisy," the Azerbaijani ministry said, claiming that these facts were misrepresented in the Russian Defense Ministry's Monday report related to the aforementioned armed incident.
The Russian Defense Ministry said on Monday that five people among those involved in the conflict had been killed in an exchange of fire between Nagorno-Karabakh law enforcers and Azerbaijani forces on March 5. The clash was stopped by Russian peacekeepers.