By Andrew Osborn and Nailia Bagirova
Russian peacekeepers have begun withdrawing from Azerbaijan’s Karabakh and other regions, ending a multi-year deployment which gave Moscow a military foothold in the strategic South Caucasus region.
The step, confirmed by the Kremlin and Azerbaijan on Wednesday, comes as Russia faces pressure in the wider region with neighbouring Armenia demanding Russian border guards leave its main airport and protesters in Georgia confronting what they say is a Russia-leaning government.
Nearly 2,000 Russian peacekeeping troops deployed to the breakaway region of Nagorno-Karabakh in November 2020 under a Moscow-brokered deal that halted six weeks of fighting between Azerbaijani and ethnic Armenian forces.
Despite the deployment, Azerbaijan retook Karabakh by force in September last year in a move which triggered an exodus of 120,000 ethnic Armenians living there and the arrest of the breakaway area’s ethnic Armenian leaders.
Armenia’s political leadership accused Moscow at the time of failing to protect Armenian interests, a charge Russia rejected.
Unverified video of Russian armoured personnel carriers purportedly driving towards Dagestan in southern Russia was posted on social media in Azerbaijan on Wednesday.
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