Women volunteers join Nagorno Karabakh battlefield

The wife of Armenia's prime minister, Anna Hakobyan, wrote on her Facebook page on Monday that she was starting military training and would soon be sent to the frontline of the conflict with Azerbaijan in Nagorno-Karabakh. Hakobyan said she was joining a squadron of consisting of 13 women.

One of the female volunteers who might make it to the frontline before Hakobyan is Susanna, who has her heart set on becoming a sniper. On Tuesday she was continuing her training with other volunteers at an undisclosed location in Nagorno-Karabakh.

"I have never participated in any conflict, have never lived in camp conditions," she said."Now, I want to be a sniper. This is the main thing that I want," she added. The Armenian military says more volunteers are signing up every day to join the fight. One of those, Aida Seropyan, said gender was irrelevant when it came to protecting their country.

"Everyone, including women, men of all ages, who are capable of getting here and picking up a rifle, they need to come to fight to protect the homeland," she said. Fighting over the separatist territory of Nagorno-Karabakh raged on Tuesday, unimpeded by a US-brokered cease-fire, while Armenia and Azerbaijan traded blame for the deal's quick unraveling.

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. By then, Armenian forces not only held Nagorno-Karabakh itself but also captured substantial areas outside the territory's borders. The latest fighting, which began September 27 has involved heavy artillery, rockets and drones in the largest escalation of hostilities over the separatist region in the quarter-century since the war ended.