Azerbaijan, Turkey hold joint military drills near Armenia
- 23 October, 02:21
Azerbaijan on October 23 announced that it would hold joint military exercises with its ally Turkey.
The drills involving 3,000 military personnel will be held in capital Baku, Nakchivan exclave bordering Armenia, Iran and Turkey, as well as in parts of the Nagorno-Karabakh region recaptured after the war with Armenia, according to the Azerbaijani Defence Ministry’s statement.
The military exercises are named after the founder of modern Turkey, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. These are the first drills held between the two allies since Azerbaijan’s lightning victory in Nagorno-Karbakh in early September that prompted the local de-facto government to dissolve and the region’s Armenian region flee from their homes.
Turkey has been Azerbaijan’s closest supporter during the 35-year-old conflict with Armenia that does not have any diplomatic ties with Ankara.
The Mustafa Kemal Ataturk-2023 drills that started on Monday involves Turkish and Azerbaijani commando units, as well as Turkish F-16s and Bayraktar TB2 drones, which will conduct various maneuvers against imaginary enemies.
The tree-day-drills come as Tehran will host a meeting of Armenian, Azerbaijan, Russian and Turkish foreign ministers in Tehran to discuss regional issues, including the peace process between Baku and Yerevan over the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.
