 Melkonian ordered his forces to halt their advance until the remnants of the column dried up in the early afternoon of April 1.Assessing that most refugees had left, he ordered his units to advance and sent a detachment to guard a vital tunnel leading south towards Zulfugarli.While his troops had assumed that most civilians had left Kelbajar, they encountered a GAZ-52 transport truck in the tunnel and, thinking it was a military vehicle, fired and destroyed it with rocket-propelled grenades and assault rifles.