Azerbaijanis themselves question that civilians were killed by Armenia

[MosJan]

NG: Azerbaijanis themselves question that civilians were killed by Armenians 05.03.2010 12:08 GMT+04:00 http://www.panarmenian.net/news/images/ico_print.gif http://www.panarmenian.net/news/images/ico_mail.gif /PanARMENIAN.Net/ Timed to the anniversary of Sumgait pogroms – massacres of Armenians in the Azerbaijani Sumgait between 26 and 28 February 1988, Azerbaijan held events in memory of tragic events in Khojalu of 1992 on 26 February, Sergei Zvyagin wrote in his article "Khodjalu: truth and fiction” in Nezavisimaya Gazeta.

 

"The very definition of "Khojalu events" of February 1992 is not correct. During suppression of firing points near the Khojalu village there were virtually no casualties among civilians in the village, since they had the opportunity to leave the village via the corridor created by Karabakh for the unarmed civilian population. The availability of that corridor never been questioned by observers, including Azerbaijan.

 

Nearly a hundred dead residents Khojalu were found at 11-12 km from the village, on the field between the Armenian village Nakhichevanik, situated at the administrative border with the former Aghdam region of Azerbaijan SSR, and the Azerbaijani positions near Aghdam. That area then was fully controlled by the National Front of Azerbaijan (NFA), being in opposition to pro-communist President Mutalibov.

 

Moreover, a day after journalists arrived at this place, including foreign ones, some people again returned to the field to desecrate some corpses before the visit of foreign media representatives," Zvyagin wrote.

 

"The massacre in Khojaly can be included in the "track record" of the Azerbaijani militants," the newspaper wrote. It pursued two aims: firstly, to remove from the political arena Ayaz Mutalibov, unnecessary after the collapse of the Soviet Union, and secondly, to obtain a pretext to start supported by Ankara a noisy campaign on charging the Armenians in the inhuman methods of warfare.

 

"Today the promotion of "Khojali project" has different political and ideological goals, while the means have remained unchanged: the lies and falsification.

 

The massacre of Khojalu inhabitants near Aghdam is the same crime of Azerbaijani national chauvinism, as pogroms of Armenians in Sumgait in February 1988, in Baku in January 1990, the massacre in the Karabakh village of Maraga in April 1992.

 

Unfortunately, these events have not received adequate legal, political and moral assessment so far that leads to the cynical distortion of reality in advocacy for official Baku," Sergei Zvyagin said.

 

The Sumgait pogroms (also known as the Sumgait Massacre or February Events) was an Azeri-led pogroms of the Armenian population of Azerbaijani Sumgait from 26 to 29 February 1988. On February 27, 1988, large mobs made up of Azeris formed into groups that went on to attack and killed Armenians both on the streets and in their apartments. Sumgait pogroms lasted three days and were accompanied by widespread violence, looting and murder. Sumgait events signaled the beginning of another unprecedented wave of anti-Armenian persecutions and violence in Azerbaijan, a new genocide. The victims of this of anti-Armenian persecutions and violence were Armenians of Kirovabad, Kazakhs, Khanlar, Dashkesan, Mingechaur, Baku and other towns and villages of Azerbaijan. This has led to floods of refugees from Azerbaijan in Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia.