“Azerbaijan is continuously attributing its own ceasefire violations to Armenia,” he wrote on Twitter. “Obviously, this is a creation of a pretext for new military aggression against Armenia.”
“A permanent international mechanism is needed to maintain the ceasefire regime and provide border security,” added Pashinian.
Other Armenian officials likewise said earlier that Baku is planning a fresh military offensive to try to open an “extraterritorial corridor” to Azerbaijan’s Nakhichevan exclave through Armenian territory.
Azerbaijani forces attacked and seized last month some of the Armenian army positions at various sections the border between the two countries during two days of heavy fighting that killed at least 290 soldiers. Although the hostilities were largely brought to a halt on September 14, the two sides accuse each other of violating the ceasefire with small arms fire on a virtually daily basis.
Earlier on Monday, the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry warned Yerevan over what it called a deployment of more Armenian soldiers and artillery at one of the border sections. It said that this could lead to another upsurge in violence.
The Armenian Defense Ministry confirmed the deployment but insisted that it was carried out in response to an Azerbaijani military build-up in the same area.
“The steps taken by the Armenian side … have a solely defensive nature,” the ministry said, adding that it will pull back the reinforcements if the Azerbaijani military does the same.
Tensions along the border remain high despite major progress made by Baku and Yerevan towards the signing of a bilateral peace treaty. But the two sides continue to disagree on the status of a road and a railway that would connect Nakhichevan to the rest of Azerbaijan.