US: Pompeo greets Armenian counterpart at State

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo welcomed Armenian Foreign Minister Zohrab Mnatsakanyan to the State Department for negotiations on settling the decades-long conflict with Azerbaijan.

Pompeo met earlier with his Azerbaijan counterpart, Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov.

Pompeo is meeting Friday in Washington with the foreign ministers of both countries in a bid to promote a cease-fire in hostilities over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh.

The Trump administration waded cautiously into international efforts to halt fighting between Armenia and Azerbaijan which are engaged in their worst conflict in more than 25 years.

This meeting follows two failed Russian attempts to broker a cease-fire in the worst outbreak of hostilities over the region for more than a quarter-century.

The warring sides traded accusations early Friday involving the shelling of residential areas.

Authorities in Nagorno-Karabakh said the town of Martakert and several villages in the Martuni region were struck by Azerbaijani rockets.

Nagorno-Karabakh lies within Azerbaijan but has been under the control of ethnic Armenian forces backed by Armenia since a war there ended in 1994. The current fighting that started Sept. 27 marks the worst escalation in the conflict since the war's end.

According to Nagorno-Karabakh officials, 927 of their troops have been killed, and more than 30 civilians also have died. Azerbaijan hasn't disclosed its military losses but says 63 civilians have been killed and 292 have been wounded. Armenia officially isn't engaged in the fighting)

Azerbaijan has accused Armenia of targeting its towns and villages with artillery and missiles, which Armenian authorities have denied.

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