The Defense Ministry of Azerbaijan issued a statement saying its forces suffered 2,783 losses, with more than 100 missing, in the war with Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh. Azerbaijan had not disclosed its combat losses during the conflict, which started on September 27 and ended with a ceasefire mediated by Russia on November 10.
The ministry also reported that 1,245 wounded personnel are undergoing treatment.
Previously, Azerbaijan had announced 91 civilian deaths as a result of Armenian shelling of the cities of Ganja, Barda, Tartar, and Mingachevir. These cities are situated outside the Nagorno-Karabakh region, where the hostilities began.
Armenia reported its human losses in the war as 2,425.
The Azerbaijani army gained the upper hand in the war, supported by its superior firepower, including hi-tech military drones purchased from Israel and Turkey. However, it also suffered considerable losses while overrunning Armenian defense fortifications built since the 1994 ceasefire agreement, which had ended the first conflict.
In the first war, Armenians had won by seizing control of Nagorno-Karabakh and seven districts around it. Hundreds of thousands of Azeri population had been expelled from their homes as a result of the Armenian occupation.
The latest conflict ended after Shusha, a strategic city of historic and cultural importance, was recaptured by Azerbaijani forces on November 8. Two days later, Armenia gave up and agreed to a Russian-brokered ceasefire deal, which demanded the handover of all the Azeri territories adjacent to Nagorno-Karabakh.
Shusha and other captured Armenian-populated villages of Nagorno-Karabakh also remain under Azerbaijani control according to the deal. The rest of the region and a corridor connecting it to Armenia are guarded by Russian peacekeeper troops until a final resolution is achieved, as stated in the deal.
Nagorno-Karabakh is officially recognized as a part of Azerbaijan. It was being run by Armenian separatists since the 1990s, who also used seven surrounding districts as a security buffer.
Negotiations conducted under a mediation group chaired by the US, Russia, and France failed to come up with a solution for the conflict. It proved ineffective over many years, especially in addressing the problem of the occupied Azerbaijani territories and the return of refugees.
Nikol Pashinyan, Armenian Prime Minister, in his recent messages, said that former Armenian governments had agreed to give back seven Azerbaijani districts in return for a referendum for Nagorno-Karabakh Armenians. He claimed Azerbaijan rejected the offer.
Azerbaijan, on the other hand, says Armenia has never shown genuine interest in ceding back the occupied territories. It demanded independence for Nagorno-Karabakh, offering five districts back while illegally settling two of them, Lachin and Kalbajar, with Armenian population.
