Kalbajar (Azerbaijani: Kəlbəcər, also spelled as Kelbajar, Kälbäjär, Kelbadzhar, Kelbadshar, Kelbadjar, Kelbadžar) is the administrative center of Kalbajar Rayon, and administrative territorial unit under the control of the unrecognized Nagorno-Karabakh Republic. The city along with the associated rayon was captured by Armenian forces during the Battle of Kalbajar, near the end of the Nagorno-Karabakh War.

During the Nagorno-Karabakh War, Armenians liberated the city.

Sign at northern site of the city with Armenian text: "Karvajar is an Armenian fortress".

The main street of the city.

Other city street.

Children playing football in the city.

Monte Melkonian (in Armenian: in TAO Մոնթէ Մելքոնեան, in RAO Մոնթե Մելքոնյան; sometimes simply referred to by just his first name Monte; November 25, 1957 – June 12, 1993) was a famed Armenian commander during Nagorno-Karabakh war. Melkonian had no prior service record in any country's army before being placed in command of an estimated 4,000 men in the war. He had largely built his military experience beginning from the late 1970s and 1980s where he fought against the various splintering factions in the Lebanese Civil War, against Israeli troops in the Israeli invasion of Lebanon and was a member of the Armenian organization ASALA.

An Armenian-American, Melkonian left the United States and arrived in Iran in 1978 during the beginning of the 1979 Iranian Revolution, taking part in demonstrations against the Shah. Following the collapse of the Shah's monarchy in 1979, he traveled to Lebanon during the height of the civil war and served in an Armenia militia group in the Beirut suburb of Bourj Hammoud. In ASALA, he took part in the assassinations of several Turkish diplomats in Europe during the early to mid-1980s and was later arrested and sent to prison in France. In 1989, he was released and in the following year, acquired a visa to travel to Armenia.