EU lawmakers on Thursday accused Azerbaijan of carrying out "ethnic cleansing" against the Armenian residents of Nagorno-Karabakh, and urged the bloc to impose sanctions on Baku.

Almost all of the 120,000-strong ethnic Armenia population has fled the breakaway region since Azerbaijan seized it back in a lightning offensive last month.

The European Parliament approved a resolution saying it "considers that the current situation amounts to ethnic cleansing and strongly condemns threats and violence committed by Azerbaijani troops."

The lawmakers called on the EU's 27 member states to "to adopt targeted sanctions against individuals in the Azerbaijani government" over the assault and alleged human rights breaches in Nagorno-Karabakh.