Protesters blocked a California freeway to bring attention to the conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia, according to reports.
Hundreds of protesters took to the streets of Los Angeles on Saturday, waving Armenian flags and holding up signs that demanded media pay attention to the conflict between the neighboring nations, the LA Times reported.
Freeway traffic slowed in both directions around 9:30 p.m., Officer Don Conley of the California Highway Patrol said. By 10:15 p.m., demonstrators had forced the highway to close.
Traffic began to move again after 11 p.m.
The Armenian Youth Federation had organized an earlier protest that day, having already organized one outside the Azerbaijan consulate that drew over 1,000 people, CBS Los Angeles reported.
A clash on Sept. 27 resulted in Armenia instituting martial law and Azerbaijan declaring a state of war. Each nation deployed troops to the heavily contested Nagorno-Karabakh region, with intense fighting “along the entire front line,” according to Armenian Defense Ministry spokeswoman Shushan Stepanian.
Each side accused the other of attacking civilians in a clash that is possibly the most violent since a 1994 ceasefire between the nations. Protests in several nations have broken out, demanding attention to the conflict before it grows more severe.
