The renewed violence coincided with efforts to resolve two issues hindering a durable peace between the neighbours – demarcation of the border and an agreement on allowing free transit for Azerbaijan to its exclave of Nakhchivan.

Ever since Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko launched a brutal crackdown to retain power last August, Minsk has been increasingly isolated—and has lashed out at its neighbours, such as Poland, who support the Belarusian opposition.

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, accused by Western countries of masterminding a humanitarian calamity on his country’s border with Poland, proposed sending to Germany some of the thousands of migrants stranded there, but Germany and the European Union immediately rejected the proposed scheme.