Chief of Azerbaijan’s State Border Service Elchin Guliyev has said that Armenia has repeatedly sought to stage provocations and advance its combat positions on the border with Azerbaijan, EDNews.net reports citing Azernews.

Guliyev noted that Azerbaijan armed forces have resolutely thwarted such provocations.

“As a result of the response measures, many of our positions up to 2,000 meters away from the state border have been moved forward 1,500-1,700 meters, which has enabled to increase the security of the nearby settlements and highways, as well as the security of the personnel, and to create new border checkpoints in strategically advantageous areas,” he said.

The State Border Service Chief pointed out that at the same time, the control capabilities over the adversary's settlements, highways and strategically important objects have been increased.

Guliyev said that Armenian forces have staged provocations on the border, firing at civilians and unarmed border guards carrying out engineering work. Azerbaijan has retaliated by destroying Armenia’s firing points and manpower and the adversary has suffered  five to six times more losses, the official said.

He also touched upon the recent Armenian provocation in the Tovuz direction of the Azerbaijani-Armenian state border, saying that the Armenian sabotage was thwarted.

Guliyev noted that after the State Border Service undertook the protection of the Azerbaijani-Armenian state border in the Gazakh-Agstafa regions, 89 border checkpoints and four modern military unit complexes have been built and put into operation for the border guards on the line of direct contact within a short period of time. Moreover, a military unit complex and three border checkpoints are being completed.

“Measures are also being taken to increase the combat capability of border checkpoints, to provide our border guards with modern weapons, detection devices and other technical equipment, to improve engineering supplies,” Guliyev added.

He said that these measures also include the construction of roads leading to the combat posts along the entire service area and between the posts, as well as the construction of protective barriers along the road to ensure safety, the supply of special radio communications to all border combat positions, upgrade of the line communication system, installation of hundreds of video surveillance cameras and solar panel systems at border combat positions.

Furthermore, Guliyev said that the thousands-strong rally in support of the Armed Forces and the Supreme Commander-in-Chief on July 14 in Baku once again demonstrated the unbreakable will of the Azerbaijani people as well as people’s trust in the Azerbaijani Armed Forces and the country’s leadership.

“The resolute position of our Supreme Commander-in-Chief, the growing strength of our Armed Forces and the fighting spirit of our people will soon lead to the liberation of Azerbaijani lands," Guliyev added.

Azerbaijan and Armenia are locked in a conflict over Azerbaijan’s Nagorno-Karabakh breakaway region, which along with seven adjacent regions was occupied by Armenian forces in a war in the early 1990s. More than 20,000 Azerbaijanis were killed and around one million were displaced as a result of the large-scale hostilities.

Recently, Armenia has stepped up its military provocation not only on the line of contact along Nagorno-Karabakh, which is the main source of tension, but also on the state border with Azerbaijan.

On July 12, Armenian forces shelled Azerbaijan's positions in Tovuz, Azerbaijan's strategically-important district on the border. The Armenian attack killed 12 Azerbaijani servicemen, including an army general, as well as a 76-year-old civilian. Armenian forcers retreated after suffering losses in Azerbaijan's retaliation.