Armenian soldier killed in Azerbaijan border clash

Azerbaijani troops killed an Armenian soldier in a fresh clash along the volatile border between the two bitter rivals, the Armenian government said on Monday. Hrant Pokhosyan, 26, was killed on Saturday when his convoy came under attack at a northeastern sector of the border, Armenia's defense ministry said. "Azerbaijan continues ceasefire violations... The actions of the Armenian Armed Forced will be preventive and stern," the ministry said in a statement. Armenia and Azerbaijan are locked in a festering decades-long feud over the breakaway region of Nagorny Karabakh. Soldiers along the heavily fortified frontline exchange gunfire almost daily, with both sides blaming each other for violating the ceasefire. Armenia-backed separatists seized Nagorny Karabakh from Azerbaijan in a war that killed 30,000 people in the 1990s. Despite years of negotiations since a 1994 ceasefire, the two sides have still not signed a peace deal. Azerbaijan has threatened to take back the disputed region by force if negotiations do not yield results, while Armenia has vowed to retaliate against any military action. For the first time in two years, Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliyev and the Armenian leader Serzh Sarkisian met last month in Austria and agreed to hold further talks in the months ahead in the hope of advancing negotiations toward a peaceful settlement.