The pogroms of Armenians in Baku, which started 32 years ago on this day, were a direct consequence of state-sponsored Armenophobia. Today marks the 32nd anniversary of those pogroms—the third, after the 1905 and 1918 mass pogroms of Armenians in Baku. The Human Rights Defender (Ombudsman) of Armenia, Arman Tatoyan, wrote this on Facebook. He added as follows:

Many Armenians were killed, deprived of their belongings, and tortured as a result of the Armenian pogroms in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, on January 13-19, 1990, and up to 20. Before those atrocities, 230-250 thousand Armenians lived in Baku.

The facts confirm that the pogroms of Armenians in Baku was organized by the Popular Front of Azerbaijan (PFA), and [Azerbaijani] the authorities backed them.

During the January 11 rally of the National Front of Azerbaijan, calls were made for the expulsion of Armenians from Baku and a large-scale armed campaign toward Karabakh.

On January 13, the pogroms of Armenians in Baku already became organized and widespread. That same evening, about 50,000 crowd gathered in Baku's Lenin Square for a rally, chanting "Glory to the heroes of Sumgait," "Long live Baku without Armenians," and other slogans.

Then, splitting into groups led by the activists of the Front, the destroyers began to consistently "clean" the city—from house to house—of Armenians. There is ample evidence of atrocities and murders committed with exceptional brutality. For example, cases of throwing people out of windows, killing them with iron rods and knives, raping women, burning alive.

Etibar Mammadov, one of the leaders of the Front, said in January 1990: "I personally witnessed when two Armenians were killed not far from the train station. The crowd had gathered, poured gasoline on them and burned them, whereas two hundred meters away was the police station of Nasim district, there were 400-500 soldiers of the internal troops there, who drove 20 meters past those charred corpses, and no one tried to disperse the crowd.” (Gazeta.ru).

According to the testimonies of the Armenian refugees of Baku, at first a group of 10-20 people broke into the apartment, and started beating, committing atrocities.

Then the representative of the National Front appeared, as a rule, with already properly worded documents on the exchange or alleged sale of the apartment, after which the landlords were offered to leave the apartment immediately and go to the port. People were mostly allowed to take personal belongings, but at the same time, they were taking away [their] money, valuables, and savings books.

The facts show that the pogroms were assisted by [Azerbaijani] law enforcement agencies, public utility workers (they provided the addresses of the Armenians' apartments), and ambulance doctors (they presented the deaths of the Armenians as heart disorders). According to various data, up to 450 or more people were killed.

The facts prove that we are talking about the Azerbaijani policy of ethnic cleansing and genocide, which was based on state-sponsored Armenophobia against Armenians.

The evidence confirms that not only has Armenophobic sentiment not diminished [in Azerbaijan] since then, but we have witnessed more brutal manifestations in subsequent years.

The Armenocide, the torture of an Armenian by nationality have been encouraged by the Azerbaijani authorities’ agencies..

A concrete proof of this is the brutal murder—during an international training course in Budapest in February 2004—of Armenian officer Gurgen Margaryan by an Azerbaijani army officer with an axe in his hotel room while he was sleeping. He [i.e., the Azerbaijani officer] was later extradited to Azerbaijan, and after that he was not only released, but also deserved a high level of heroism.

During the April 2016 and September-November-2016 wars against the population of Artsakh [(Nagorno-Karabakh)], the staff of the Human Rights Defender of Armenia recorded objective evidence which testify to numerous cases of atrocities by the Azerbaijani armed forces on the basis of ethnicity—including numerous cases of brutal killings, torture, disrespect toward the bodies of the civilians and servicemen of the Armenian side.

The international world community, especially international organizations with a mandate to protect human rights, need to contribute, with decisive steps, to the prevention of the reprehensible propaganda of Armenophobia and enmity towards.