Armenia first brought up charges against the Azerbaijani government for destroying khachkars in 1998 in the town of Julfa. Several years earlier, Armenia had supported the Armenians of Karabakh to fight for their independence in the enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh in Azerbaijan, in the First Nagorno-Karabakh War. The war concluded in 1994 when a cease fire was signed between Armenia and Azerbaijan. The Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh established the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, an internationally unrecognized but "de facto" independent state. Since the end of the war, enmity against Armenians in Azerbaijan has built up. Sarah Pickman, writing in "Archaeology", noted that the loss of Nagorno-Karabakh to the Armenians has "played a part in this attempt to eradicate the historical Armenian presence in Nakhchivan."