Cannot connect to Azure Ubuntu VM - Public Key Denied

Question

We have been using Ubuntu VM's on Azure for some time now and rarely had a any problems. However, one of the VMs has gone bonkers lately. Out of the blue, the Ubuntu VM starts rejecting the public key -

ssh -i ~/azure.key [email protected]
Permission denied (publickey).

Verbose gives me even more confusing signs -

~$ ssh -i -v -v -v ~/azure.key [email protected]
Warning: Identity file -v not accessible: No such file or directory.
OpenSSH_5.9p1 Debian-5ubuntu1.1, OpenSSL 1.0.1 14 Mar 2012
debug1: Reading configuration data /etc/ssh/ssh_config
debug1: /etc/ssh/ssh_config line 19: Applying options for *
debug2: ssh_connect: needpriv 0
ssh: Could not resolve hostname /home/abc/azure.key: Name or service not known

Wondering if anyone saw this problem or can suggest ideas/solutions?

Answer 1

How about the following?

$ ssh -i ~/azure.key -v -v -v [email protected]