Azerbaijan ally Turkey says it played no direct role in Karabakh operation

A view shows damaged cars in front of a residential building following the launch of a military operation by Azerbaijani armed forces in the city of Stepanakert in Nagorno-Karabakh, a region inhabited by ethnic Armenians, September 19, 2023. Siranush Sargsyan/PAN Photo via REUTERS/File Photo

ANKARA (Reuters) -Turkey is using "all means", including military training and modernisation, to support its close ally Azerbaijan but it did not play a direct role in Baku's military operation in Nagorno-Karabakh, a Turkish defence ministry official said on Thursday.

Azerbaijan mounted a lightning offensive to retake control of its breakaway Karabakh region on Tuesday. It later announced a ceasefire that would disarm the ethnic Armenian separatists who had held much of the region - regarded internationally as part of Azerbaijan - since the 1990s.