Separatist government of Nagorno-Karabakh says it will disband by January 2024

Some 42,500 people, or about 35% of Nagorno-Karabakh’s ethnic Armenian population, had left for Armenia as of Wednesday morning, officials said (AP)

The separatist government of Nagorno-Karabakh has announced that it will dismantle itself and the unrecognised republic will cease to exist by January 1 2024.

The move comes after Azerbaijan carried out a lightning offensive to reclaim full control over its breakaway region, demanding that Armenian troops in Nagorno-Karabakh lay down their weapons and urging the separatist government to disband.

A decree to that effect was signed by the region’s separatist President Samvel Shakhramanyan.

The document cited an agreement reached last week to end the fighting under which Azerbaijan will allow the “free, voluntary and unhindered movement” of Nagorno-Karbakh residents and disarm troops in Armenia in exchange.

Nagorno-Karabakh is a region of Azerbaijan that came under the control of ethnic Armenian forces, backed by the Armenian military, in separatist fighting that ended in 1994.

A Russian military helicopter transports the wounded from a field hospital in Nagorno-Karabakh to the Armenian side (Russian Defence Ministry Press Service via AP)

During a six-week war in 2020, Azerbaijan took back parts of Nagorno-Karabakh along with surrounding territory that Armenian forces had claimed during the earlier conflict.

In December, Azerbaijan imposed a blockade of the only road connecting Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenia, alleging that the Armenian government was using the road for mineral extraction and illicit weapons shipments to the region’s separatist forces.

Armenia charged that the closure denied basic food and fuel supplies to Nagorno-Karabakh’s approximately 120,000 people.

Azerbaijan rejected the accusation, arguing the region could receive supplies through the Azerbaijani city of Aghdam — a solution long resisted by Nagorno-Karabakh authorities, who called it a strategy for Azerbaijan to gain control of the region.

After the blockade was lifted following the offensive and a ceasefire agreement brokered by Russian peacekeepers, more than half of Nagorno-Karabakh’s population – 65,000 people – have fled to Armenia.