Moscow has a defence alliance with Armenia, while Ankara backs its ethnic Turkic kin in Azerbaijan. Majority Christian Armenia and mainly Muslim Azerbaijan first clashed in the 1980s over Nagorno-Karabakh, a breakaway region that is inside Azerbaijan but mostly populated and run by ethnic Armenians. People are seen in a bomb shelter in Stepanakert, the capital of the breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region, in this picture released September 28, 2020. They have run their own affairs, with support from Armenia, since Nagorno-Karabakh broke away from Azerbaijan in a conflict that erupted as the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. Although a ceasefire was agreed in 1994, Azerbaijan and Armenia frequently accuse each other of attacks around Nagorno-Karabakh and along the separate Azeri-Armenian frontier.

Source: bd News24 September 28, 2020 13:30 UTC