Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has called on Armenia to withdraw from the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region.
“It is now time to end the crisis in the region that began with the occupation of Nagorno-Karabakh.
The region will regain peace and tranquillity if Armenia immediately leaves the Azerbaijani soil it has occupied,” said Erdogan Monday in Istanbul.
Turkey is on the side of Azerbaijan “by all means and with all its heart”, he added.
The Armenian-controlled region of Nagorno-Karabakh, with an estimated 145,000 inhabitants, is part of Islamic Azerbaijan under international law. There has been fighting there again since Sunday.
The Azerbaijani government in the capital Baku lost control of the area in a war following the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Since 1994, an armistice has been in effect in the region inhabited by Christian Karabakh Armenians. Impoverished Armenia counts on Russia as a protective power. Oil and gas-rich Azerbaijan have Turkey as its ally.