Clinton warns of ‘disastrous’ Azerbaijan-Armenia clashes

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Wednesday warned of possible “disastrous consequences” after a flare-up of deadly violence between ex-Soviet enemies Azerbaijan and Armenia. Clinton held talks with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev in Baku as the reported death toll in gunbattles between the two neighbours this week rose to nine amid the worst clashes since 2010. After the talks, she said she was “deeply concerned about the danger of escalating tension, which could have unpredictable and disastrous consequences.” “This cycle of violence and retaliation must end,” she said. Baku and Yerevan are locked in a bitter unresolved conflict over the disputed region of Nagorny Karabakh, which Armenia-backed separatists seized from Azerbaijan in a bloody war in the 1990s. An Armenian soldier was killed in a firefight in Karabakh on Wednesday, separatist officials in the region said — an incident that followed the deaths of five Azerbaijani troops and three Armenians in clashes on their mutual border on Monday and Tuesday. The United States is a co-chair with Russia and France of the OSCE Minsk Group, which was set up after the 1994 Karabakh ceasefire to help bring a resolution to the conflict. But no peace deal has yet been signed and the conflict remains unresolved, leaving Armenia suffering economically from closed borders with Azerbaijan and its ally Turkey, while Baku has grown richer on its Caspian Sea oil deposits. The United States has sought to balance its relationship with both countries, pressed on one side by the large American Armenian community and Washington’s strategic interests in the Caspian basin on the other.