Explained | Fight between Armenia and Azerbaijan, and the stakes

Thousands of refugees are fleeing into Armenia after Azerbaijan claimed control of an Armenian enclave inside its territory, reshaping in just two days of fighting a conflict that has resulted in two wars since the collapse of the Soviet Union.

By Tuesday, the Armenian government said, 19,000 forcibly displaced people had entered Armenia from Nagorno-Karabakh. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan of Armenia said in a speech Sunday that Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh were facing “the threat of ethnic cleansing” unless “effective mechanisms of protection” were created in the enclave under Azerbaijani rule.

On Monday, officials said, dozens of people were killed by a blast in a fuel depot, which witnesses said struck as people lined up to refuel their cars before evacuating.

The return of the enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh to Azerbaijani control is also likely to alter power dynamics in the South Caucasus, a region that for centuries has been at the crossroad of geopolitical interests of Russia, Turkey and Western nations.

Decades of violence and geopolitical rivalry underpin the dispute between the two former Soviet republics over the enclave, which lies within Azerbaijan’s internationally recognized borders and has been home to tens of thousands of ethnic Armenians.

Armenian separatists’ surrender could hasten the decline of Russian influence in the Caucasus, where Moscow’s role as an arbiter in the conflict made it a pivotal power. It could also threaten instability in Armenia, where Pashinyan has sought to build closer ties with the West despite a military alliance with Russia.

Here’s a guide to the long-running conflict.

What’s behind the dispute?

As the Soviet Union was collapsing, Nagorno-Karabakh declared its independence with the intention of reunifying with Armenia. The declaration was one cause of a war that followed; tens of thousands of people were killed and hundreds of thousands were displaced. A cease-fire in 1994 left Armenia in control of the territory and seven surrounding districts.

A second war erupted over 44 days in 2020, during which thousands were killed and tens of thousands displaced. This time, Azerbaijan, using Turkish and Israeli attack drones, recaptured much of the territory and its surroundings.

Russia, a longtime protector of Armenia, brokered a cease-fire and deployed about 2,000 peacekeepers to the region.

The government in Azerbaijan, whose economy has been strengthened by exports of oil and natural gas, has been seeking to cement its military gains from 2020, both through talks on a more permanent peace deal and by increasingly blocking overland traffic between Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh.

“The war was devastating for Armenia,” Olesya Vartanyan, who analyzes the South Caucasus region for the International Crisis Group think tank, said earlier this year. Azerbaijan already had most of what it wanted, she added, but, “They need it formalized.”

What happened in the latest fighting?

On Sept. 19, Azerbaijan’s Defense Ministry described its forces’ actions as “local anti-terrorist” operations, saying they were using precision weapons to target what it said were Armenian firing points and other military facilities in the area.

A statement from the enclave’s unrecognized pro-Armenian government said that its capital and other cities and villages were “under intensive bombardment,” in a “large-scale military offensive.”

By the end of Sept. 20, the separatist authorities reported that at least 200 people had died because of the hostilities, including 10 civilians; the rest were army service members. The numbers could not be independently verified. Separately, the Russian Defense Ministry reported that several of its peacekeepers were killed when their car came under small-arms fire as they returned from an observation point.

That day, Azerbaijan said it would halt the operation because the separatist government had agreed that its forces would lay down their arms and withdraw from their battle positions.

Around the same time, the Armenian separatist government issued its own statement declaring that it had accepted a Russia-brokered cease-fire after Azerbaijani forces managed to break through Armenian positions and “take control of a number of heights and strategic road junctions.”

Pashinyan of Armenia said that his government had played no role in drafting the cease-fire and that it had no troops in Nagorno-Karabakh, according to news agency reports. News of the separatists’ surrender brought a crowd of thousands into the main square in Yerevan, Armenia’s capital, denouncing Pashinyan’s failure to intervene and calling for him to be arrested.

President Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan, by contrast, gave a triumphant address to his nation. “Karabakh is Azerbaijan,” he concluded, raising his fist in the air.

What happens now?

Ever since the 2020 cease-fire, Azerbaijan has insisted that it was due full control of all of Nagorno-Karabakh under an eventual peace deal. It has demanded that the ethnic Armenians there either submit to Azerbaijani governance or depart. Armenia has condemned Azerbaijan’s demands as a form of ethnic cleansing, while Russia has appeared powerless to de-escalate tensions.

In his address on Sept. 20, Aliyev of Azerbaijan promised that “rights will be guaranteed” for Armenians in Karabakh, but few were persuaded by a message coming from the leader of a nation many Armenians see as bent on destroying them. Aliyev also said that Azerbaijan would bring to justice “elements and leaders” of the breakaway government.

Many of the tens of thousands of Armenians who live in the area are adamantly against coming under Azerbaijani control, citing multiple past grievances as well as the fear of repercussions for those who fought against it.

A stream of cars, buses, heavy-duty trucks and even tractors, loaded with duffel bags containing basic possessions and sometimes animals, has been pouring out of Nagorno-Karabakh steadily since Sunday. The central square of Goris, a town across the border in Armenia, has turned into a makeshift refugee camp, with people looking for shelter and other help.

Leaders from the separatist government met with Azerbaijani representatives on Sept. 21, escorted to the talks by Russian peacekeepers.

What is the regional backdrop?

The loss of Nagorno-Karabakh has prompted many in Armenia to question the traditional view that Russia was their main protector in a region where great power interests collide.

Moscow has long played a central role in the dispute, but the war in Ukraine has hampered Russia’s ability to project regional military power, and its peacekeepers are likely to see their role further diminished in the wake of Azerbaijan’s victory in September.

Turkey, which has been pursuing an increasingly assertive foreign policy, also has a stake in the regional conflict, and it sides with Azerbaijan. It is a member of NATO but has made security overtures to Moscow and has purchased a Russian missile system over Washington’s objections.

For its part, Washington has long sought influence in the South Caucasus and other states in the former Soviet bloc. The European Union, while pushing for talks, has turned to Azerbaijan in its search for energy partners to make up for the loss of Russian imports since the start of the war in Ukraine. And it has sent observers to monitor Armenia’s border with Azerbaijan.