After serviceman's killing, analysts treat risk of escalation of Karabakh conflict as minimal

The killing of the Azerbaijani border guard will not be an occasion to exacerbate the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict, analysts have predicted.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that on January 7, the Armenian Ministry of Defence (MoD) announced an attempt of Azerbaijani militaries' advance on the frontline. In its turn, the Azerbaijani frontier service denied these allegations and reported the death of Farzali Farzaliev, a border guard, as a result of a sniper shot from the Armenian side.

Azerbaijan is not interested in the escalation of tensions, Mekhman Aliev, Director of the "Turan" News Agency, believes, explaining that Baku is focusing on other issues.

"The first one is domestic politics: the process of reformatting the power is now underway in Azerbaijan; this is not the best time to initiate hostilities," Mr Aliev has stated.

In his opinion, the second reason for Baku's disinterest in escalating the conflict is the USA-Iran confrontation. "In the near future, the Azerbaijani authorities will be busy counteracting the activation of the pro-Iranian forces," Mr Aliev has concluded.

Azad Isazade, a former employee of the information and analytical department of the Azerbaijani MoD, also doesn't expect any conflict escalation. After the January 7 incident, the shelling intensity remained unchanged, he has stated.

In the opinion of Togrul Djuvarly, a member of the Azerbaijani National Committee for European Integration, no large-scale military operations on Azerbaijani-Armenian border should be expected so far in the context of the strengthening of the Azerbaijan's position at negotiations. However, in his opinion, this cannot continue for a long time either. Until there is real progress at negotiations, the risk of war remains, he has concluded.