What happened
On the evening of 12 February 2024 Azerbaijan's State Border Service said a border guard in the Zangilan district had been wounded by fire from the direction of the Armenian village of Nerkin Hand; Armenia's defence ministry said it had found no such incident. Early on 13 February fire on an Armenian post near Nerkin Hand killed four Armenian soldiers and wounded one, all named by the Armenian ministry. Azerbaijan's border service announced the fire itself as a retaliation operation.
It is the only incident on the Armenia–Azerbaijan border since the 2023 offensive that both governments put on the record as fire, and the last in which anyone was killed: the Armenian prime minister later dated the end of border casualties to it. It came three months before the commissions completed the Tavush section, and marks the line between a border that still killed people and the process that followed. What it does not establish is who fired first on 12 February: that rests on one side's account and the other's denial.
Confidence: High
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