By Ivan Gharibyan

January 13 will always remain one of the most disgraceful pages in Azerbaijan’s history, which put an end to all the talks about “international and peace-loving Baku.” Twenty year ago, after a rally held by the nationalist Popular Front of Azerbaijan (PFA), several thousand brutalized people began to attack the Armenians’ flats. A distinctive feature of the unprecedented pogroms was the fact that the attacks and murders had been planned according to a list of the Armenian residents put up at the PFA headquarters in Baku.

At present the subject of the Armenian pogroms, as well as the underlying domestic political reasons for the tragic events, is strictly taboo in Baku. The then Azeri authorities headed by Abdurakhman Vezirov, and even the PFA itself, fell victim to the intrigues by the politician veteran Heydar Aliyev, who had been relieved of the post of Azerbaijan’s leader for conniving at widespread corruption and supporting the clan system.

Abdurakhman Vezirov, who was appointed First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan, spared no efforts to put an end to “the Aliyev style”, purge the Central Committee of the “creatures from Nakhchevan,” who tried to destabilize the situation in Azerbaijan by stirring up anti-Armenian hysteria. He openly stated that the interethnic problems in Azerbaijan were the result of Aliyev’s policy. Moreover, he accused Aliyev of being immediately involved in supplying food for a round-the-clock rally in Baku, which was dispersed by Soviet troops in December 1988.

By January 13, when the Armenian pogroms in Baku took place, the Armenian population in the city has decreased four times, down to 50,000. The tragic events were the result of the seizure of power by the PFA and collapse of the USSR. As the acts of extreme brutality were being committed, the Soviet troops stationed in Baku were blocked in the district of Salyansk barracks. Some of the Russian servicemen’s family members were killed or injured. The PFA had blocked the Soviet troops for the only purpose of leaving the Armenian population defenseless against the thousands of brutalized fascists.

The Supreme Soviet of Azerbaijan was unable to hold a sitting to give consent to a state in emergency in Baku, as the tens of thousands of PFA supporters had blocked the central offices of government agencies, threatening the Supreme Soviet members with bloody reprisals.

Heydar Aliyev, who was in Moscow, would not listen to Mikhail Gorbachev’s requests to call on his supporters to leave the streets of Baku, which was full of riots, vandalism and murders. The plan was a clear one: Heydar Aliyev sought as many victims as possible and forced introduction of thousands of Soviet troops into Baku, to have the people demand the return of “Heydar baba” later.

Now that Heydar’s son, Ilham Aliyev, is ruling supreme in the khanate of Azerbaijan, the Armenian pogroms in Baku, which began on January 13, 1990, and lasted for several days, are a taboo subject there. On the other hand, on Ilham Aliyev’s order, the central mass media of Azerbaijan are actively preparing to mark the 20th anniversary of the “January 20 tragedy” — the introduction of Soviet troops to Baku, which prevented genocide against the local Christian population.

Facts, however, are stubborn things! Whatever efforts the Azeri authorities, as well as the mass media at their service, exert, they have to accept the truth. There is no point in concealing the fact of Armenian pogroms in Baku. It would be enough to look through the issue of Bakinski Rabochiy (Baku Worker) newspaper of January 15, 1990, when the government agencies were still functioning anyhow. On the front page you can see an announcement on the first days of Armenian pogroms, January 13-14, signed by three top-ranking Azerbaijani officials – First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party Abrurakhman Vezirov, Chairwoman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of Azerbaijan Elmira Kafarova and Head of the Council of Ministers of Azerbaijan Ayaz Mutalibov. According to the official announcement, “ethnic Armenians were mostly” victims of the pogroms, which fact confirmed the ethnic nature of the tragic events in Baku. Still, the nonsense spread by the official Azeri propaganda is aimed not only at stirring up an anti-Armenian hysteria, but also at concealing the fact of Heydar Aliyev’s complicity in the Armenian massacre in Baku.

As the saying goes, hope springs eternal in the human breast. So let us hope that one fine day most of the Azerbaijanis will come to realize their being befooled by their own leaders and take a sober view of the disgraceful and tragic pages of their own history. What is more, the truth can be learnt from the honest individuals that, risking their own life, saved their Armenian neighbors and friends in those tragic days.

T.P.