The Battle of Kelbajar took place in March and April 1993, during the Nagorno-Karabakh War. It resulted in the capture by Armenian military forces of the Kelbajar region of Azerbaijan. Kelbajar lay outside the contested enclave of the former Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast, but within Nagorno-Karabakh geographic region of Azerbaijan, that Armenian and Azerbaijani forces had been fighting over for five years. The offensive was the first time Armenian forces from Nagorno-Karabakh had advanced beyond the boundaries of the enclave. Kelbajar rayon, located between Armenia and the western border of fomer NKAO, was composed of several dozen villages and its provincial capital, also named Kelbajar. According to Russian sources mountain troops from the 128th Regiment (7th Russian Army) stationed