Nagorno-Karabakh: France Expects Truce within Hours

The French presidency, told Agence France-Presse, that Armenia and Azerbaijan are "moving towards a truce" that will end the ongoing battles in Nagorno-Karabakh on Friday night or Saturday.

It is scheduled that a meeting will be held between senior officials from both sides of the conflict in Moscow on Friday, despite the continuing fighting in the disputed region.

"We are moving towards a truce in the Nagorno-Karabakh region either tonight or tomorrow, but it is still fragile," said a spokesman for French President Emmanuel Macron.

"It is a coordinated operation since the beginning of the week with (Russian President) Vladimir Putin," the French official said.

His comments came after the French president spoke by phone with Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan on Thursday night and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev on Friday.

France, along with Russia and the United States, is overseeing peace talks between the two parties over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh.

On Friday, Russia announced that Armenia and Azerbaijan had agreed to participate in negotiations in Moscow aimed at ending the battles in Nagorno-Karabakh, after Putin called for it.

"Baku and Yerevan have confirmed their participation in the Moscow consultations," Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told AFP, adding that "preparations are underway" for the talks expected later Friday, in which the foreign ministers of the two countries will participate.

However, officials in the defense ministries of Armenia and Azerbaijan reported that violent clashes continued on Thursday night and Friday, resulting in more civilian casualties after Putin announced Thursday night the Moscow meeting and appealed to the two parties to cease fire for humanitarian reasons.

Fighting erupted between Armenian separatists and the Azerbaijani army late last month in an effort to control the disputed region, which declared independence from Azerbaijan after a war in the 1990s.

The two sides have repeatedly ignored the calls to stop the fighting, which has killed about 400 people, including dozens of civilians, while Azerbaijan has stated that it is determined to regain the region, whose population is the majority Armenians.