A MEDIEVAL CEMETERY VANISHES WITHOUT A TRACE
By Idrak Abbasov
The Moscow Times, Russia
May 16 2006
AZERBAIJANI-IRANIAN BORDER — It has become one of the most bitterly
divisive issues in the Caucasus — but up until now no one has been
able to clear up the mystery surrounding the fate of the famous
medieval Christian cemetery of Jugha in Azerbaijan.
Armenians regarded the cemetery as the biggest and most precious
repository of medieval headstones marked with crosses — called
khachkars — more than 2,000 of which were still there in the late
1980s. Each elaborately carved tombstone was a masterpiece of carving.
Armenians say the cemetery was razed, comparing its destruction
to the demolition of two giant Buddha figures by the Taliban
in Afghanistan. Azerbaijan has hit back by accusing Armenia of
scaremongering and of destroying Azerbaijani monuments on its own
territory.
Now an IWPR contributor has become the first journalist to visit
the site of the cemetery on Azerbaijan’s border with Iran — and has
confirmed that the graveyard has completely vanished.
The European Parliament, UNESCO and Britain’s House of Lords have
all taken an interest in the fate of the Jugha cemetery. But so far
no one has been allowed to visit the site itself.
If international observers can confirm that the cemetery has been
razed, it is sure to spark a new high-voltage row between Azerbaijan
and Armenia, which have engaged in a bitter war of words since fighting
ended in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict in 1994.
The IWPR contributor was accompanied by two Azerbaijani security
service officers and was restricted in his movements. He was unable
to go down to the River Araxes, the site of the former cemetery, as
it lies in a protected border zone. But he was able to see clearly
that there was no cemetery there.
This is one of the most inaccessible parts of Europe, located in the
Azerbaijani exclave of Nakhichevan, which is surrounded by Armenia and
Iran and — because of the unresolved Armenian-Azerbaijani dispute —
is only accessible from the rest of Azerbaijan by air.
Old Julfa, or Jugha as it is known by the Armenians, was a flourishing
Armenian town in the Middle Ages. But in 1604, Shah Abbas of Persia
forcibly resettled the inhabitants to Isfahan, where to this day
there is still an Armenian quarter, New Julfa. The ruined town and
its cemetery remained and were visited by many. Britain’s Sir William
Ouseley arrived in July 1812 and found “a city now in perfect decay,”
and the remains of what had been one of the most famous stone bridges
in the world.
Historian Argam Aivazian, the principal expert on the Armenian
monuments of Nakhichevan, said Jugha was a unique monument of medieval
art and the largest Armenian cemetery in existence. Aivazian last
visited the site in 1987, when it was still mostly intact.
Artist Lusik Aguletsi, a Nakhichevan-born Armenian, also last visited
the cemetery in 1987, although she was under escort. “There is nothing
like it in Armenia,” she said. “It was a thrilling sight. Two hills
completely covered in khachkars. We weren’t allowed to draw or
photograph them.”
Armenian experts now accuse Azerbaijan of a deliberate act of cultural
vandalism. “The destruction of the khachkars of Old Jugha means the
destruction of an entire phenomenon in the history of humanity, because
they are not only proof of the culture of the people who created them,
they are also symbols that tell us about a particular cultural epoch,”
said Hranush Kharatian, head of Armenia’s state department for national
and religious minorities.
Photos copyright Argam Aivazian
A view of the medieval Christian cemetery and its elaborately carved
tombstones marked with crosses in the 1970s.
Although the historical provenance of the cemetery is disputed
in Azerbaijan, its cultural importance is confirmed by the 1986
Azerbaijani book “The Architecture of Ancient and Early Medieval
Azerbaijan” by Davud Akhundov. The book says the stones are of
Caucasian Albanian origin, in line with the official theory taught
in Azerbaijan that Christian monuments there were not the work of
Armenians but of Albanians. Caucasian Albanians, a people unconnected
with Albania, lived in the southeastern Caucasus, but their culture
began to die out in the Middle Ages.
Husein Shukuraliev, editor of a local newspaper, Voice of Araxes,
said the destruction of the cemetery began as early as 1828, when
Azerbaijan became part of the Russian empire. Thousands of tombstones
were then destroyed at the turn of the 20th century when a railway
was constructed, he said.
However, other people said there has been more recent destruction of
the cemetery. A man named Intigam who repairs tin cans in Baku said
he was posted near Julfa with the Soviet Army in 1988 and 1989. In
late 1989, Azerbaijani politician Nemat Panakhov dismantled the
border-posts on the border with Iran. Intigam said part of the Julfa
cemetery was destroyed at that time.
Panakhov declined to comment.
A second witness, who asked that his name not be published, said
there were khachkar stones on the site up until 2002, but they were
removed on orders of the Nakhichevan military command.
Armenian architect Arpiar Petrossyan said he visited the Iranian side
of the border in 1998 with a friend to view monuments there. Looking
across the river into Azerbaijan, he said, they noticed a flat-bed
train apparently removing cross-stones from the cemetery.
Armenian Deputy Culture Minister Gagik Gyurdjian said Armenia raised
the alarm in 1998. “Then we got the entire international community
up in arms and stopped the destruction. But in 2003 the destruction
started again,” he said.
In recent months, the propaganda war over Jugha has reached a new
intensity — just as Karabakh peace talks between Presidents Ilham
Aliyev and Robert Kocharian ran into trouble. Aliyev angrily denied
Armenian claims about the Jugha cemetery last month, calling them
“a lie and a provocation.”
International institutions are now demanding to be allowed to visit
the site of the cemetery. However, Azerbaijan is insisting that it
will only accept a European parliamentary delegation if it visits
Armenia as well. Azerbaijan’s Foreign Ministry says 1,587 mosques
and 23 madrassas have been destroyed in Armenia.
Avetik Ishkhanian, president of Armenia’s Helsinki Committee, blames
the international community for not reacting sooner to the razing
of Jugha, contrasting the response with the outcry that followed the
Taliban’s demolition of the Buddhas of Bamian in 2001. “Why has there
not been the same reaction in this case?” he said.
Reporting also by Shahin Rzayev and Jasur Mamedov in Baku; and Seda
Muradian, Narine Avetian and Karine Ter-Sahakian in Yerevan. This
article comes from the Caucasus Reporting Service of the Institute
for War and Peace Reporting,