The person who played a major role in the Armenian pogroms in Baku was Heydar Aliyev, who had yet to become president of Azerbaijan back then. This is also the statement by political scientist Arif Yunosov, who has cited the words of Aliyev’s supporter who, in an interview, stated that they needed bloodshed, and the more, the better. This is what head of the Ordinary Genocide project Marina Grigoryan told Armenian News-NEWS.am today.

She added that Russian writer Kiril Stolyarov has also underscored Aliyev’s role in the events, and in his book, he cites Aliyev’, who said there is no need to be afraid of bloodshed and the more, the better. “Those people needed to kill their citizens, including the Armenians. This was also manifested during the events of Khojalu which were the consequence of domestic political events in Azerbaijan,” Grigoryan explained.

From February 26 to 29, 1988, Armenian pogroms took place in the Azerbaijani city of Sumgait, and based on official statistics, the pogroms left 27 dead and hundreds wounded. In a matter of days, 18,000 Armenians left the city. Two years later (from January 13 to 19, 1990), Armenian pogroms took place in Baku, leading to the murders of nearly 100 people and the expulsion of more than 200,000.