Ruben Vardanian, a former Russian citizen of Armenian descent who served as prime minister in the de facto government of the breakaway region of Nagorno Karabakh, has begun a hunger strike in a Baku prison, his family said on April .

   Armenia has agreed to return four abandoned border villages that it has controlled since the early s to Azerbaijan as the initial step in defining the frontier between the two bitter South Caucasus rivals, the countries said in identical statements on April .

   The Group of Seven G nations have called on Armenia and Azerbaijan to remain fully committed to the peace process as the group’s foreign ministers issued a communique after their meeting in Capri, Italy, on April .

   A preliminary agreement has been reached in Brussels on providing nonlethal assistance to Armenia from the European Peace Facility EPF , according to a diplomatic document obtained by RFE RL.

   The Kremlin has confirmed that Russian peacekeepers are leaving Azerbaijan’s once breakaway region of Nagorno Karabakh.

   Iran says it has received assurances from Armenia regarding its concerns about the potential escalation of geopolitical competition in the South Caucasus stemming from the Armenian leader’s recent high level discussions with U.S. and EU officials in Brussels.

   Azerbaijan and Armenia will fight out a long running ethnic cleansing dispute at the top United Nations court from April , just as military tensions are ramping up between the historic enemies.

   At least four Armenian soldiers were killed and others injured on April when the military vehicle they were in veered off the road and fell into a ravine.

   A top EU diplomat on April said he wants to see genuine, substantial negotiations between Armenia and Azerbaijan leading to a peace treaty, agreements on border delimitation, and opening of transport links.

   Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan will not attend an upcoming meeting of his counterparts from the Commonwealth of Independent States CIS , a Foreign Ministry spokesperson has announced.

   Russian military police have captured a Russian soldier in Armenia wanted in his homeland for refusing to fight in Ukraine, according to the Vanadzor branch of the Helsinki Citizens’ Assembly.

   Members of the opposition in Armenia’s parliament said their concerns over negotiations with Azerbaijan on border delimitation issues were not allayed by government officials during a special session.

   Armenia and Azerbaijan have reached several agreements as part of their continuous peace treaty negotiations, but they remain divided on two main issues, according to Armenia’s top diplomat.

   Armenia and Azerbaijan fired at one another’s positions along their shared border, with both sides accusing the other of violating a cease fire.

   The European Union and the United States have pledged hundreds of millions of dollars to Armenia as Yerevan looks westward amid failing relations with its traditional ally, Russia.

   U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev on April about the importance of advancing the peace process between Baku and Armenia, a State Department spokesman said.

   The European Union’s border monitoring mission in Armenia EUMA has reported no unusual movements of the Armenian military after Azerbaijan earlier on March claimed Armenian troops had massed along the border.

   Armenian banks on March said they would stop processing transactions made by Russian Mir payment cards due to Western sanctions imposed on Moscow for its invasion of Ukraine.

   To many, in the Caucasus, in particular, the tragedy of the killings of Lilit Israelian and Vugar Huseynov was compounded by the improbability of a match that spanned the deep ethnic divide stemming from a decades long conflict.

   Two men were wounded by a grenade they detonated as they attempted to storm a police station in Armenia’s capital on March , the Interior Ministry of the Caucasus country said.