Soldiers Were Captured, Not Abducted: Defense Ministry Representative Clarifies Incident

A larger group was involved in the operations, but only 6 of them were captured. This was stated today at a press conference by the Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the Armenian Armed Forces, Major General Edward Asryan.

As previously reported, 6 of our soldiers were captured this morning in Gegharkunik. "While performing engineering works in the territory of military unit N of the RA Armed Forces, six servicemen of the RA Armed Forces were surrounded and captured by the armed forces of Azerbaijan," the Ministry of Defense announced.

According to Asryan, four servicemen were present at the scene of the operations, carrying out a task, while the other two were from the command group and had approached to conduct negotiations. They believed the matter would be resolved through this means, but the opponent treacherously captured our servicemen 800 meters deep within our territory from the state border.

In response to the question of whether the servicemen were captured or abducted, the Deputy Chief of the General Staff emphasized that the servicemen were captured, as abduction is not a term used in military terminology.

It is noteworthy that the term "abduction" was introduced into circulation by Nikol Pashinyan. "The circumstances of the capture still need to be clarified, but one thing is clear: this is essentially not a capture. Our servicemen have been abducted from the territory of the Republic of Armenia," Pashinyan announced during a government session.

Demonstrating the map published by the Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Armenia, the Deputy Chief of the General Staff stated that the opponent has managed to penetrate deep into the defense positions. The settlements of Kut, Norabak, and Azat are located at a distance of 5-6 kilometers from the front line of the operations.

According to data from one hour ago, units have provided adequate support positions. The opponent is surrounded in a trilateral manner and has one supply route coming from the Karvachar region.