Mursili II
Despite Mursili's Year 7 and probable Year 8 campaigns against Hayasa-Azzi, Anniya was still unsubdued and continued to defy the Hittite king's demands to return his people at the beginning of Mursili's Ninth year. Then, in the latter's Year 9, Anniya launched a major counter-offensive by once again invading the Upper Land region on the Northeast frontier of Hatti, destroying the Land of Istitina and placing the city of Kannuwara under siege. Worse still, Mursili II was forced to face another crisis in the same year with the death of his brother Sarri-Kusuh, the Hittite viceroy of Syria. This prompted a revolt by the Nuhašše lands against Hittite control. Mursili II took decisive action by dispatching his general Kurunta to quell the Syrian rebellion while he sent another general, the able Nuwanza (or Nuvanza) to expel the Hayasa-Azzi enemy from the Upper Land. After consulting some oracles, the king ordered Nuwanza to seize the Upper Land territory from the Hayasan forces. This Nuwanza did by inflicting a resounding defeat against the Hayasa-Azzi invaders; henceforth, Upper Land would remain "firmly in Hittite hands for the rest of Mursili's reign under the immediate authority of a local governor appointed by the king." While Mursili II would invade and reconquer Hayasa-Azzi in his tenth year, its formal submission did not occur until the following year of the Hittite king's reign.