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Nagorno-Karabakh Declares 'Period of Silence' to Identify Dead

An ethnic Armenian soldier takes a rest at an artillery position near the Nagorno-Karabakh's town of Martuni, April 7, 2016.

A “period of silence” has been declared in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict zone to allow warring parties to identify their dead, the RBC news agency reported Friday.

Defense Ministry spokesman Vagif Dargyakhly said the search will take place between 2 and 7 p.m. on Friday and will be carried out by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), RIA Novosti reported.

The declaration follows agreements on a cease-fire brokered by the Armenian and Azerbaijani sides on Tuesday.

The Azerbaijani Defense Ministry had previously reported that at least 31 Azeri fighters had been killed during the course of the ongoing conflict.

On Friday, The Armenian Defense Ministry claimed that 44 Armenian soldiers had perished since the beginning of the flare-up, RBC reported.

Representative in Russia of the unrecognized Nagorno-Karabakh Republic (NKR) Arsen Melik-Shakhnazarov told journalists that 50 people had died from the Armenian side.

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