11:16, 21 January 2020

Residents of Azerbaijan pay tribute to victims of "Black January"

A memorial march in the Alley of Martyrs. Photo by Aziz Karimov for the "Caucasian Knot"

In Baku, thousands of people came to the Alley of Martyrs on the 30th anniversary of the entry of Soviet troops. In Azerbaijan, people recalled the responsibility of the USSR authorities for the killings of civilians.

On January 20, 1990, at the instruction of the USSR leaders, 35,000 soldiers and officers of the army corps entered Baku. As a result of the operation, 137 civilians were killed and more than 744 others were wounded.

"The troops entered the city, unaware of the imposition of a state of emergency, and cruelly killed civilians," the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) of Azerbaijan reports.

The military operation was unlawful, believes Namizad Safarov, a former member of the Azerbaijani Bar Association.

The mass killings of Baku residents violated the legal documents signed by the Soviet Union, the lawyer added. "In essence and scale, those actions of the Soviet Army became a crime against humanity," Namizad Safarov emphasized.

The Soviet propaganda tried to justify the introduction of troops by "the need to stop the Armenian pogroms," notes Togrul Djuvarly, a member of the Azerbaijani National Public Committee for European Integration. However, according to him, the actions of the authorities only contributed to the pogroms.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on January 20, 2020 at 08:40 pm MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.

Author: Faik Medjid

Source: CK correspondent