AFP: Azeri security forces shot dead a young Iranian border guard who strayed into Azerbaijan, an Iranian local commander quoted by Fars news agency said on Thursday.
TEHRAN, October 20, 2011 (AFP) – Azeri security forces shot dead a young Iranian border guard who strayed into Azerbaijan, an Iranian local commander quoted by Fars news agency said on Thursday.
“Yesterday (Wednesday) in Parsabad border area, one of our soldiers, aged 18, who was not carrying any arms, lost his way into the Azerbaijan Republic when their forces fired on him in a cowardly manner,” said Mojtaba Mousavi.
“They claim he engaged with them, but when he was transfered to hospital here it turned out he was not carrying any arms,” said Mousavi, the guards’ commander in Ardebil province of northwest Iran, bordering Azerbaijan.
He said border officials met after the incident to investigate the case and decided to deal with it through diplomatic channels.
In July, Azerbaijan’s State Border Service reported one of its guards was killed in a a shoot-out when a group of armed men tried to enter the former Soviet republic from neighbouring Iran.
It said at the time that the gang evaded arrest and fled back to Iran but an investigation was underway.
Deputy Interior Minister Ali Abdollahi, who downplayed the significance of that incident as “limited,” said contacts were made between border guards of both countries.
