YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 19, ARMENPRESS: The Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Armenia Edward Nalbandyan is in different intensive contacts on the destiny of the crew of the helicopter, hit in the Nagorno Karabakh Republic. Armenpress reports that the Spokesperson of the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Armenia Tigran Balayan wrote about it in his twitter blog.  

Earlier it was reported that in the airspace of the eastern sector of the Karabakh-Azerbaijani border, in the result of the violation of the ceasefire regime, the Azerbaijani Armed Forces shot a helicopter Mi-24 of the Air Forces of the Nagorno Karabakh Republic during a training flight on November 12 at 13:45. The place of the shot is very close to the line of contact. The press service of the Defense Army of the Nagorno Karabakh Republic informed Armenpress that the rival continues firing in the direction of the incident. The details of the incident are being investigated. Later it was announced from Stepanakert that by preliminary data there are three victims. The Commander of the staff was the Major Sergey Sahakyan. Another two servicemen were Lieutenant Azat Sahakyan and Senior Lieutenant Sargis Nazaryan.  

On November 12 the OSCE Minsk Group spread a statement, condemning the incident. On November 13 the European Union issued a statement on the incident, condemning the downing of the Artsakh helicopter. The US Department of State and ministries of foreign affairs of different countries as well made statements.