According to media reports, Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh agreed to Azerbaijan's conditions to disarm to stop the military operation.
The Russian Interfax news agency reported that Armenian separatists in Nagorno-Karabakh agreed to the terms of a ceasefire proposed by Russian peacekeeping forces after suffering a series of setbacks on the battlefield at the hands of the Azerbaijani army.
The ceasefire will take effect from nine in the morning GMT today, Wednesday, and talks will be held on Thursday regarding re-integration with Azerbaijan.
Later, the Azerbaijani presidency confirmed the holding of negotiations on Thursday regarding the re-integration of the Nagorno-Karabakh region with Azerbaijan.
The Ministry of Defense of Azerbaijan also confirmed today, Wednesday, that it had reached a ceasefire agreement with ethnic Armenian forces in the Nagorno-Karabakh region.
The ministry said that the Armenian forces in the mountainous region agreed to "lay down their weapons, abandon combat positions and military sites, and completely disarm," and that all weapons and heavy equipment were being handed over to the Azerbaijani army.
For his part, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan announced on Wednesday that Yerevan did not participate in drafting the ceasefire agreement in Nagorno-Karabakh.
These developments come after reports from Yerevan that 32 people were killed and more than 200 wounded in the Azerbaijani military operation in Nagorno-Karabakh.
"As a result of the bombing, there are currently 32 dead and more than 200 wounded," Armenia's Human Rights Ombudsman Anahit Manasyan said on Facebook.
The fighting in the Nagorno-Karabakh region continued today, Wednesday, for the second day in a row, as violent explosions rocked a number of areas of the region, a day after Azerbaijani forces used heavy artillery fire to bomb Armenian positions in the separatist region.
Azerbaijan described the artillery bombardment as an "anti-terrorism operation," stressing that it will continue until the separatist Nagorno-Karabakh government announces its dissolution and the "illegitimate Armenian military formations" hand over their weapons.
The Azerbaijani army also announced that the bombing targeted military sites only, but video clips showed great destruction in the streets of the regional capital, Stepanakert, where shop windows were shattered and shrapnel caused damage to vehicles.
Explosions echoed across Stepanakert on Wednesday morning, with some explosions occurring far away and others closer to the city.
The artillery shelling raised fears of the possibility of resuming a large-scale war in the region between Azerbaijan and Armenia, which have been waging a struggle to control the mountainous Nagorno-Karabakh region for more than three decades.
The last violent fighting between the two countries lasted about 6 weeks in 2020.
The Azerbaijani Ministry of Defense announced the start of the military operation hours after announcing the killing of four soldiers and two civilians in a landmine explosion in Nagorno-Karabakh.
The ministry did not immediately provide details, but said that front-line Armenian troop positions and military equipment had been disabled "using high-precision weapons" and that only legitimate military targets were being attacked.
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