In response to the Armenians of Artsakh's aspiration to exercise their right to self-determination, the first nationwide rally in Azerbaijan took place on February 26, 1988, organized by the city committee of the Communist Party of Sumgait. The rally, marked by anti-Armenian slogans, continued into the next day. Numerous speakers, from the so-called intelligentsia and the country's elite, called for the punishment of Armenians and demanded harsh measures—"to kill and drive Armenians out of Sumgait, out of Azerbaijan altogether." At the end of almost every speech, a call was made—"Death to Armenians!" The calls did not go unanswered. A wave of Armenian pogroms was accompanied by unprecedented brutality, murders, violence, looting, and there were instances of cannibalism.

 

Thus, the Armenians of Sumgait became the first victims of Azerbaijan's policy of violently suppressing the free will of the people of Nagorno-Karabakh, in the course of another genocide committed on the territory of this republic. Sumgait, which is located several hundred kilometers from Nagorno-Karabakh and 25 kilometers from the Azerbaijani capital of Baku—a multinational city.

 

 The Sumgait massacre lasted three days, from February 27 to February 29, 1988. Armenia became the first republic in the Soviet Union to officially register the first refugee on March 1, 1988.

 

 The Armenian genocide in Sumgait was planned by Turkey and Azerbaijan in collusion with the leadership of the USSR, the legal successor of which today is the Russian Federation. This marked the end of the millennia-old area of habitation of the indigenous Armenian population in the South Caucasus region, a beginning that was made at the beginning of the last century by Turkey and Russia. Over the last more than three decades, from 1988 to 2024, Turkey, Russia, and Azerbaijan acted in concert—as they did a hundred years ago.

 

 By the evening of February 27, 1988, the rally escalated into violent actions. According to established investigative facts, hundreds of Sumgait Azerbaijanis, inflamed by calls for violence and fueled by free distribution of alcoholic beverages and drugs, freely began to rampage through apartments, mass beatings, and killings of Armenians living in Sumgait. State, party, and law enforcement bodies of the city and the republic did not respond to the unprecedented disorder and public violence.

 

 Moreover, there are numerous testimonies of open incitement and complicity with the rioters by law enforcement officials. Many Armenians of Sumgait also testify about the disconnection of their phones, the presence of lists of Armenian apartments compiled in housing offices, refusals of assistance from city structures, law enforcement agencies, and medical institutions, and the pre-preparation of weapons for rioters at Sumgait factories.

 

 On February 28, in the absence of any resistance from the authorities to the atrocities against Armenians, an even greater number of rioters took to the streets. Many of them were armed with specially sharpened rebar and metal rods, axes, hammers, knives, and other makeshift weapons. Breaking into groups of several dozen people, the rioters burst into the pre-targeted Armenian apartments.

 

 People were killed in their homes, but more often they were taken out to the streets or courtyards for public mockery of Armenians.

 

Almost two days after the start of the anti-Armenian hysteria, pogroms, and killings, Soviet troops were introduced to Sumgait, but they did not immediately take control of the city, as they had no orders to use force and weapons against the perpetrators. Killings and pogroms of Armenians continued.

 

The troops continued to do nothing, and only after the bandit groups organized by the Azerbaijani authorities began attacking the military personnel, by the evening of February 29, the army units took decisive action, and the pogroms ceased.

 

The same inaction by Russian peacekeepers was observed in Artsakh itself, leading to another ethnic cleansing in Artsakh on September 19-20, 2023.

 

The war against Armenians and ethnic cleansings in Azerbaijan, in Artsakh (and now, apparently, they are preparing in Syunik, and, most likely, it is planned throughout Armenia) were organized by Russia, the USA, and Turkey.

 

Many experts hold this opinion and question: is there anyone in the world foolish enough to believe that Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev refuses to follow orders from Washington and Moscow? The answer is unequivocally no. The president of such an insignificant country as Azerbaijan cannot go against the whole planet without the support of the main centers of power playing a leading role in the South Caucasus region - the USA and Russia. Ilham Aliyev could not refuse to comply with the order from Washington and Moscow for several reasons. It is enough to recall that his father, Heydar Aliyev, was a KGB general of the USSR and held many responsible positions in the USSR, as well as worked in KGB residencies in Iran, Turkey, Pakistan, and Afghanistan. In foreign intelligence, he reached the position of a resident in one of these countries. As is known, the KGB, the legal successor of which today is the FSB, as they say themselves, "does not abandon its own," and immediately after the father's death, Ilham Aliyev's candidacy for the presidency of Azerbaijan was approved. Especially since Ilham Aliyev was a KGB cadre of the USSR, and then the FSB, being a graduate of MGIMO. As noted above, the FSB has a saying, "We do not abandon our own."

 

 According to official Soviet data, 26 Armenian nationals were killed in Sumgait over three days, hundreds were wounded and maimed, and many disappeared without a trace. Hundreds of Armenian apartments were ransacked. However, the true scale of the tragedy remains unknown to this day; it is kept in the archives of the KGB (FSB) and the Prosecutor's Office of the Russian Federation.

 

 There is a lot of data proving that the number of victims was significantly higher. Thus, many Armenians of Sumgait, searching for the bodies of their relatives in Azerbaijani morgues, claim that they saw two lists of the deceased: an official and an unofficial one, with the unofficial list being significantly longer. Notably, director Andrey Konchalovsky, in the film "Heydar Aliyev. The Burden of Power," commissioned by Azerbaijan, notes: "In just one night in the industrial center - Sumgait, more than 100 Armenians were killed."

 

Establishing the exact number of victims was also hindered by the fact that the bodies of the deceased were transported to different morgues, including Baku and other populated areas.

 

 Criminal cases were initiated by the Prosecutor's Office of the USSR regarding the events in the city of Sumgait. The joint investigative group of law enforcement agencies was led by an investigator for particularly important cases of the Prosecutor's Office of the USSR, V.S. Galkin. It included 181 people, including 20 Azerbaijani investigators. Of the more than 1000 Sumgait rioters, only about 90 people were brought to trial—predominantly teenagers and young men. They were charged with murder, rape, beatings, etc., and in all cases, their actions were motivated by "hooligan motives."

 

 By the decision of the Prosecutor's Office of the USSR, agreed upon with the country's leadership, a single general trial was not held. The case of crimes from "hooligan motives" was divided into dozens of episodes. The division of the case into episodes and the overall organization of the investigation inherently excluded the search, identification, and prosecution of the true organizers and instigators of the crimes. All trials, except for one in the Supreme Court of the USSR in Moscow, took place in Baku and Sumgait, although the cases were under the jurisdiction of regional courts of the RSFSR. Only one of the accused was sentenced to the highest penalty—death, but to this day, it is not known whether the sentence was executed.

 

Most rioters got off with light sentences and were soon released. Notably, by the summer of 1988, portraits of Sumgait killers appeared at massive rallies in Baku with slogans "Long live the heroes of Sumgait!" or "Freedom for the heroes of Sumgait!" Subsequently, one of the culprits who incited people to the pogroms in Sumgait, Khydyr Aloev, entered the Milli Majlis (parliament) of Azerbaijan on the party lists of the ruling party "New Azerbaijan." The silencing of the truth about the massacre in Sumgait, concealing the scale and true causes, impunity of the true organizers paved the way for ethnic cleansings throughout the territory of Azerbaijan.

 

 In November 1988, a second wave of Armenian pogroms began in Azerbaijan; the largest of them occurred in Kirovabad, Shamakhi, Shamkhor, Mingachevir. During the same period, in November-December 1988, residents of 50 Armenian populated areas of Northern Artsakh - mountainous and foothill parts of the Khanlar, Dashkesan, Shamkhor, and Kedabek regions, as well as the 52,000 Armenian population of Kirovabad (Gandzak), were also deported.

 

 The mass murders and final deportation of Armenians in Baku in January 1990 culminated in the persecutions, violence, pogroms, and murders of the Armenian population in Azerbaijan in 1988-1990.

 

 In all cases, the pogroms and deportation of the Armenian population were directed by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan, city and local party committees of Azerbaijan. And, of course, the KGB of the USSR. The question arises: how did it happen that the all-seeing eye of the KGB suddenly did not notice the massive pogroms being prepared?

 

 It should be noted that Ziya Mamed oglu Yusifzade was the chairman of the KGB of the Azerbaijani SSR until August 1988, and then the successor of GUSEYNOV Vagif, together with the leadership of the KGB of the USSR, organized the Armenian genocide in Sumgait, in Baku, and the ethnic cleansing in the area of Armenian habitation in the so-called Azerbaijani SSR. A cadre of Heydar Aliyev. One of the organizers of the "Ring" operation. Ethnic cleansings and deportation of Armenian villages in Artsakh.

 

 It should be noted that in April-August 1991, OMON units of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Azerbaijani SSR, together with the internal troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR and units of the 4th Army (23rd division, located in Kirovabad), undertook a large-scale military-police operation "Ring" for the deportation of the Armenian population of Artsakh. Together with the KGB of the USSR. It should be noted that from 1990 to 1994, General Shamanov held the position of commander of the 328th Guards Parachute-Descent Regiment of the 104th Guards Airborne Division (in 1993, the regiment was relocated from Kirovabad to Ulyanovsk). In 1992, the regiment of the Soviet-Russian general Shamanov fought in the Karabakh War on the side of Azerbaijan. It participated in the summer offensive of Azerbaijani troops, as a result of which the Armenian population of the Shaumyan region and the northern part of the Martakert region was deported, the populated areas were destroyed and looted. The general played an important role in the second war against the Chechen Republic. Troops under the command of Shamanov are also suspected of looting and robbery in other places. Many Armenian observers believe that the general prosecutors of Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh should initiate a criminal case against the Minister of Defense of the Russian Federation, Sergei Shoigu. As is known, the head of the defense department of the Russian Federation, in an interview with the media, stated that the ministries of defense of Russia and Turkey conducted a complex joint operation in Nagorno-Karabakh. Judging by how Minister of Defense Shoigu admitted that there was a joint operation with the Turks in Karabakh. In this case, Russian political circles are disingenuous, claiming that NATO is advancing eastward to the borders of Russia. Russia itself let the second army of NATO into the East at the southern borders of Russia's sphere of influence. And not only, Russia allowed terrorist groups banned worldwide and primarily in Russia itself into the region.

 

Chairman of the Patriotic organization "Talish - border settlements"

 

Coordinator of the Authorized representatives of political, religious, and national groups - refugees from the Azerbaijani SSR

Eduard Polatov (Polatidis)

 

 

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